
Alabama now officially has a Department of Workforce.
Late Friday, Gov. Kay Ivey announced the state’s Department of Labor would officially change its name and focus on Feb. 1, with former State Sen. Greg Reed as the state’s first secretary of workforce.
The full transition for the department will take place later this summer, according to an announcement from Ivey.
Marty Redden, who has been serving as labor secretary, is retiring. Reed was picked last year to oversee the department’s transition, which was created by the passage of last year’s Alabama Workforce Transformation Act. The switch to Workforce had a deadline of Oct. 1.
The change came as the state is marshaling efforts to increase Alabama’s workforce participation rate, 57.6%, lower than the national rate at 62.5% and among the lowest in the nation. The rate is the percentage of people in the working-age population who are employed or seeking jobs.
The department will also oversee other duties traditionally associated with the Department of Labor, such as workplace safety and child labor enforcement, unemployment and workers’ compensation, labor market information and inspections.
“Increasing Alabama’s labor force participation rate is the current focus of our workforce development efforts,” Ivey said. “We are attracting significant business investments and new jobs, and we are helping our existing companies grow, and it is imperative we prepare our workforce.”
In an interview with AL.com last month, Reed said he sees two main issues contributing to the low participation numbers. One is a lack of training for new business sectors in the tech industries. The other is the need for more emphasis on job training and counseling in the early grades of high school to put students on sustainable career paths.
Reed said he is “immensely honored” to be the first to lead the department.
“It is my commitment that this new agency will do all that it can to ensure Alabama workers are the best trained and most highly skilled in America,” Reed said. “It will be my focus to champion Gov. Ivey’s goals by collaborating with the business community, the education community, the manufacturing and industrial community, the Alabama Legislature and our federal delegation to coordinate our efforts and achieve best outcomes for the people of Alabama. I could not be more excited about this new and important initiative.”
During his tenure in the Alabama Senate, Reed sponsored numerous pieces of legislation with a focus on workforce transformation and economic development.