Winona WorkForce Center

August 2007

PLEASE NOTE: Pre-Registration is REQUIRED for these workshops.

Minnesota Business Tax Education Program

Workshops

The cooperating agencies of the Business Tax Education Partnership sponsors free workshops to provide business tax education to business owners and employees. These workshops help you meet your obligations by knowing:

◊      the taxes you are responsible for

◊      the forms you need and their due dates

◊      the tax implications for different industries and different entities

◊      strategic tax management considerations

◊      sound record keeping practices

Practical, real-world business tax information for busy people like you! Up-to-the-minute information on state and federal taxes that apply to your business.

See the full list of workshop descriptions and information on how to register for:

◊     Employment tax workshops (Please note: This link will take you directly to the Unemployment Insurance Minnesota site).

Sales and Use tax workshops

Workers' compensation training

Workers’ compensation training is offered to customers, about a variety of subjects, by Department of Labor and Industry staff members. Some classes are sponsored by the department and take place at its 443 Lafayette Road N., St. Paul, location (directions and map) or at another site chosen by the department. 

Welcome to LandIt!

http://www.landit.org

THE job & internship listing site of the MN College & University Career

Employers

Participation is free and employers gain the ability to:

• Visit one centralized and online location to reach candidates at 30+ MN institutions!
• Quickly and easily post internships and jobs and have them automatically sent to all (MCUCSA) schools
• Receive applications the way you choose!

• Click here to get started!

Minnesota Job Bank is in the midst of change.  Watch for news about  a launch date for the improved public service website to better connect  employers and job seekers.

MNOSHA Audiovisual loan program

Because of requests from the public, Minnesota OSHA (MNOSHA) has established an audiovisual loan program.  The purpose of this effort is to support MNOSHA’s educational and outreach efforts in the area of workplace safety and health.

This is the web link:  http://www.doli.state.mn.us/oshainfo.html   Click on Video Library

Minnesota Attorney General's Library http://www.ag.state.mn.us/Resources/ResourcesLegal.asp#search#search

Access to legal resources on the Internet

“Veteran Friendly Employer”

The implementation of a “Veteran Friendly Employer” identification initiative is being taken by DEED.  Action is being taken to encourage businesses to identify themselves as a “Veteran Friendly Employer”  when entering  their job opportunities in Minnesota Job Bank.  The entry, “Veteran Friendly Employer” when entering their Job Description of the order.  This will allow Veterans using MJB to “easily” locate these businesses, and job listings, by entering the phrase “Veteran Friendly Employer” in the “More Search Options” Job Search tool.

Contact your local Workforce Center at 507-453-2920.  Ask for Tom or the Veterans Representative.

Custom Training and

Continuing Education
Minnesota State College-Southeast Technical
1200 Storr's Pond Road  Winona, MN 55987

Some SBDC seminars offered in October and November:

Sep 27 –Oct 11     Importing and Import    Regulations

Oct 16   Entrepreneurial Solutions to Renewable

                        Energy Needs

Oct 19 & 20    Inventrepreneur Boot Camp

Oct 24 – Nov 15    Core Four Business Planning Course

Contact Robert Nilsson for details at  507-453-2747

The Fall Course Catalog for Custom Training at Southeast Technical College will be available the week of August 27.  The classes cover a variety of occupational areas including Health, Business, Safety, Computers, Trade & Industry, and Driver Training.  Coursework is offered online, blended, home study and traditional classes.  Seminars, classes, and certificates are available in Red Wing, Winona, Caledonia and Wabasha

 Continuing Education classes are designed to help busy working adults and dislocated workers gain professional and personal occupational skills.  Last year, over 6,000 students participated in Continuing Education classes through Custom Training at Southeast Tech.

For more information, visit

www.southeastmn.edu/custom training or call 507-453-2740.

PC Energy Report 2007

Wasting Energy While We Sleep

You wouldn’t leave your television on all day while you are at the office, and yet, across the country, millions of work PCs are on all night—wasting energy, costing owners millions in utility costs, and contributing to global climate change.

A mid-sized company wastes more than $165,000 a year in electricity costs for computers that have been left on overnight.1 By turning these computers off, an employer can keep more than 1,381 tons of carbon dioxide (C02)2 out of the atmosphere. Across the nation, this adds up to more than $1.72 billion dollars and almost 15 million tons of CO23 . Few problems match an impact so large with a solution so simple.

A computer uses energy even when it appears to be idle. Reducing that waste can help businesses reduce costs and prevent tons of damaging greenhouse gases from being emitted in our atmosphere.

Ideally, everybody would shut down their PCs at the end of a working day. Research we have commissioned from Harris Interactive® shows that this doesn’t always happen. Some people assume their IT departments need their machines to be left on overnight in order to deploy security patches and software updates. Others believe an on-board “sleep” or hibernation mode kicks in, which isn’t usually the case. And an alarming number of people admit that they just don’t care.

To help companies and organizations gain tighter control of their energy consumption, software solutions and service provider 1E teamed up with the Alliance to Save En­ergy (ASE) to examine PC power usage in the American workplace. In this report, you will find current statistics on energy usage and CO2 emissions, alongside our research on behavior in American workplaces (i.e., whether em­ployees are shutting their PCs off at the end of the day, why, and why not).

You will also learn about power management tools used by large private and public sector organizations, which save energy during the day and overnight through centralized control over power usage of corporate PCs.

It is evident from the findings of this report that worker apathy and insufficient business systems are the cause for wasting a tremendous amount of energy, and that government programs to address this waste are still in their infancy.

Summary of Key Findings

104 million office PCs: As of April 2007, 145,800,000 Americans have full-time jobs.9 According to the survey conducted by Harris Interactive® on behalf of 1E,10 72 percent of all employed adults11 regularly use a PC for work purposes at their jobs. Combining these findings suggests that more than 104 million workers reach the end of the work day with a PC to shut off—or not to.

On all night: : Of those 104 million employed adults who regularly use a PC at work, as many as 60 percent (62.4 million) don’t always shut them down at the end of the day.12 Twenty percent (20.8 million) “never” shut down.13

Millions in the balance: Assuming that 50 percent of PC users have “hibernation” or “sleep” mode enabled14, companies across the coun­try are wasting $1.72 billion15 to supply power to PCs that are not always shut down. This figure is based on a conservative estimate of 14.5 hours for the overnight period with the assumption that com­puters have no power management features enacted. Under this sce­nario, a single company with 10,000 PCs wastes more than $165,000 a year.16 One large financial institution that worked with 1E determined that shutting PCs down every night saves $3 million a year in electricity costs alone.

More power, more CO₂: Over the course of a year, generating the power to leave a computer on overnight creates 920 pounds of CO2.17 If 60 percent of the country’s work PCs are used this way—and 50 percent use “hibernation” or “sleep” mode—then 14.4 million tons18 of carbon dioxide is being pumped into the atmosphere each year, needlessly. Preventing that amount of CO2 from reaching the atmosphere would have roughly the same impact as taking 2.58 million passenger cars19—more than exist in the entire State of Maryland (2.48 million20)—off the road entirely.

Into the woods: It takes between 60 and 300 trees to absorb the yearly CO2 emissions generated by a single PC left on 24 hours a day.21 That means it would take between 1.24 and 6.24 billion trees to absorb the emissions caused by the nation’s office computers that are never shut down.22 • • • • •

Of those 104 million employed adults who regularly use a PC at work, as many as 60 percent (62.4 million) don’t always shut them down at the end of the day.

http://www.1e.com/energycampaign/downloads/1e_Brochure_060807FINAL2.pdf

Minnesota Employment Review…

Read the May 2007 issue at http://www.deed.state.mn.us/lmi/publications/review.htm  This issue features our annual Teen Summer Employment Outlook as well as a Regional Spotlight on a cross-state workforce and economic development initiative in the southeastern corner of Minnesota and neighboring counties in Wisconsin and Iowa.

A River Runs Through It

 Regional Spotlight: Southeast Minnesota

by Jennifer Ridgeway- jennifer.ridgeway.state.mn.us

Residents, businesses, and workers in extreme southeastern Minnesota have forged a relationship that transcends Vikings-Packers boundaries, Iowa-Minnesota jokes, and the mighty Mississippi. It is a labor market region where dollars and people flow freely across the corners of Minnesota, Iowa, and Wisconsin, even though political boundaries attempt to segregate the states. This article provides an overview of this region’s industry and workforce composition and introduces a new regional workforce development project.

Drug-Free Workplace Kit: Understand the Legal Requirements

Establishing a drug-free workplace policy can be hard.  Employers who are considering adopting such a policy usually have many questions, reservations, and concerns.  http://www.workplace.samhsa.gov/WPWorkit/legal.html is a good resource for answers to these questions, reservations and concerns.

Income Tax Credit for Employers Extended to August 2011

~ More businesses eligible due to expanded qualifying criteria ~

ST. PAUL — Minnesota businesses can reduce their federal income tax liability by as much as $9000 for each qualifying new hire under the Work Opportunity Tax Credit (WOTC).  The WOTC was extended to 2011 when President Bush signed the Small Business and Work Opportunity Tax Act earlier this year.  The legislation also significantly expands businesses’ eligibility for the federal tax credit.  

Visit    http://www.deed.state.mn.us/wotc/  for more information and necessary forms.

FEDERAL MINIMUM WAGE INCREASES

The federal minimum wage for covered non-exempt employees will become: 

           $5.85 per hour on July 24, 2007;

           $6.55 per hour on July 24, 2008; and

           $7.25 per hour on July 24, 2009.

FREE Federal Minimum Wage Law Poster

The first thing inspectors look for when they visit your business is required posters to be posted.  It’s the law!

Go to http://mnwfc.org/winona and click on the “poster” link in the 4^th red box.  Or contact Tom at 507-4532-2937

http://www.mbda.gov/

The Minority Business Development Agency (MBDA) is part of the U.S. Department of Commerce and is the only federal agency created specifically to foster the establishment and growth of minority-owned businesses in America. 

Vision Statement

The Minority Business Development Agency vision is to function as an entrepreneurial organization serving entrepreneurs.

Mission Statement

The Minority Business Development Agency mission is to enhance the growth and expansion of minority business enterprises.

Strategic Direction

The long term goal of “Achieving entrepreneurial parity for minority business enterprises” is the benchmark by which MBDA’s critical Federal government role will be measured. Although businesses with revenues of $1 million or more constitute just 3% of the overall minority business community, these businesses are responsible for 66% of the total revenues of minority-owned enterprises and 54.4% of employment. In order to promote overall U.S. economic growth, it is critical to promote medium to large businesses enterprises that can have a significant impact on employment and the tax base in their communities. Increasing the number of medium and large minority businesses is in the short and long term strategic interest of achieving MBDA’s Vision of wealth creation. In pursuit of entrepreneurial parity, MBDA has established a Strategic Growth Policy. The Strategic Growth Policy is designed to address the issue of sustainable business value for firms of size operating in growth industries.

Programs focused on providing access to capital and markets will be the prime components of the Strategic Growth Policy.

A new paradigm for minority business development requires that the public and private sectors expand their present focus from outreach, certification, and dollars spent to include enabling minority business enterprises to achieve size, scale, scope, education, access to technology and capital. Minority business development services must be designed to create sustainable business values. In order to implement the new paradigm, MBDA will develop a more industry focused, data driven technical assistance approach to give minority business owners the tools essential for becoming first or second tier suppliers to corporate America and the Federal government in the new procurement environment. Sustainable value will translate into entrepreneurial parity and strategic growth through increased gross receipts, number of employees, size and scale of firms associated with minority business enterprise.

For more information contact Tom at the Winona Workforce Center, 1250 Homer Road Suite 200, 507-453-2937

Revised 2007 EEO-1 Report

The EEOC collects workforce data from employers with more than 100 employees (lower thresholds apply to federal contractors). Employers meeting the reporting thresholds have a legal obligation to provide the data; it is not voluntary. The data is collected using the reports below and is used for a variety of purposes including enforcement, self-assessment by employers, and research. Each of the reports collects data about gender and race/ethnicity by some type of job grouping. This information is shared with other authorized federal agencies in order to avoid duplicate collection of data and reduce the burden placed on employers. Although the data is confidential, aggregated data is available to the public.

In 2007, the EEO-1 report will be modified. The major changes involve dividing the job category of "Officials and Managers" into two levels. Revised race/ethnic categories will also be implemented. The EEOC plans to update the other reports to use the same race and ethnic categories as the new EEO-1 but, before doing so, will give respondents a full reporting cycle to change their recordkeeping. For example, if the EEO-4 form is modified in 2007, the change will not be implemented until 2009.

http://www.eeoc.gov/eeo1/index.html

 http://www.eeoc.gov/employers/surveys.html

All revisions to the EEO-1 survey form are in 'Section D- Employment Data' only. Sections A, B, C, E, F, and G remain unchanged

Minnesota Department of Labor and Industry

e-mail lists

                                                   visit:  http://www.doli.state.mn.us/agencyelists.html

Veteran Job Fair

Earle-Brown Heritage Center

6155 Earle Brown Drive

Minneapolis, MN

11:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

Tuesday, November 6

Help With Navigating DOL

Laws and Regulations

The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) is committed to providing its customers — America’s employers, workers, job seekers, and retirees — with clear and easy-to-access information on how to comply with federal employment laws. This information is often referred to as "compliance assistance," which is a cornerstone of the Department’s efforts to protect the wages, health benefits, retirement security, employment rights, safety, and health of America’s workforce.

DOL’s Office of Compliance Assistance Policy, working with many DOL agencies, leads a variety of Department-wide compliance assistance efforts, including this Web portal. All of our compliance assistance activities are designed to provide businesses, workers, and others with the knowledge and tools they need to comply with DOL’s rules.

http://www.dol.gov/compliance/ is the website for more information

EMPLOYER’S GUIDE

to Filing Timely & Accurate W-2 Wage Reports

Following is the Index page of the report to show its contents:

Go to http://www.ssa.gov/employer/Guide501.doc

for complete downloadable document

SOCIAL SECURITY ADMINISTRATION

Office of Income Security Programs

SSA Pub. No. 16-004

ICN 361752

May 2007

INDEX

HOW TO AVOID ERRORS ON FORMS W-2 AND W-3                                   

APPENDIX

FEDERAL CONTRACTORS ALERT!!!!!!!! 6/26/2007 from Bonnie Elsey
America’s Job Bank Transition

As you no doubt have heard, on July 1^st, 2007, America’s Job Bank (AJB) will no longer be supported by U.S. Department of Labor and will be shut down. This has little effect on the operation of Minnesota’s public labor exchange. Coincidentally, Minnesota’s Job Bank will implement an upgraded website soon, to be called MinnesotaWorks.net. The old address will redirect you to the new address: http://www.minnesotaworks.net .

For some employers, AJB served an important distribution function and was free of charge. Employers could send all of their job orders directly to AJB who would then redistribute them to the states where the jobs were located. If you are an employer interested in this process, there are alternatives to replace that function.

America’s Job Exchange (http://www.americasjobexchange.com/) and Job Central - Employers Direct (http://www.jobcentral.com) are two sites Minnesota has elected to work with in this regard. Both offer to collect and redistribute job orders to the states but with slightly different business revenue models. America’s Job Exchange uses an advertising model and Job Central is a subscription model.  Using either one of these vendors will get your job order on our website.

If you are a federal contractor and interested in how working with these websites will help you in your efforts to comply with contract requirements, we suggest you seek assistance at the website: http://www.dol.gov/esa/ofccp/ .

A recent update was released by the U.S. Department of Labor regarding compliance: “We appreciate that transitioning to a new job listing mechanism may cause difficulties for contractors posting jobs, veterans receiving priority referrals to those jobs from state agencies, and state agencies responsible for providing services to veterans. Accordingly, until further guidance is provided by OFCCP, the agency, as a matter of enforcement discretion, will not cite a contractor for non-compliance solely because it has failed to list all of its employment openings with the appropriate employment service delivery system or the appropriate local employment service office, provided that it continues to make good faith efforts to recruit and employ qualified covered veterans. In order to ensure the continuation of both an effective job referral system for veterans and the recruitment of qualified veterans by Federal contractors, the agency will provide guidance as soon as possible.”  This update can also be accessed at:

http://www.dol.gov/PrinterFriendly/PrinterVersion.aspx?url=http://www.dol.gov/esa/regs/compliance/ofccp/AJB%20FAQ%206-2007.htm.

We hope this transition will be smooth for you and we invite you to check out the new features we have to offer in Minnesota. Thanks for your business and cooperation!

Sincerely, 

Bonnie Elsey

Division Director, Workforce Development Division 

I-9 Verification without discrimination

The Office of Special Counsel for Immigration-Related Unfair Employment Practices of the U.S. Dept. of Justice is responsible for enforcing the anti-discrimination provisions of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), 8 U.S.C. § 1324b, which protect U.S. citizens and certain work authorized individuals from employment discrimination based upon citizenship or immigration status discrimination. Tips for use of I-9 can be found at http://www.usdoj.gov/crt/osc/htm/smbus.htm

GRAY SKIES AHEAD?

The state’s workforce is on the cusp of some big changes.  Now is the time to get ready.  A good link for older workers information can be found at http://www.aarp.org/money/careers/employerresourcecenter/