Cuts threaten job-training program

OLYMPIA – Five years after the launch of INTEC, an economic development and job-training organization in Spokane, state budget writers want to cut off the hundreds of thousands of dollars the group gets each year from state taxpayers.

“There were enough questions raised as to whether it was really fulfilling the goals it was originally designed for,” said Sen. Margarita Prentice, D-Renton, chairwoman of the Senate budget committee. “And when the situation’s muddy, things tend not to get included.”

The House budget, released this week, followed the Senate’s lead. Both budgets call for eliminating $968,000 slated for INTEC over the next two years.

“Because it was taken (out) in the Senate, we anticipated that it was not a priority,” said Rep. Helen Sommers, D-Seattle, chairwoman of the House Appropriation Committee.

Rep. Alex Wood, D-Spokane, said, “There’s one person on the Appropriations Committee – I won’t say who – who thinks INTEC is not worth the money, really hasn’t proven itself and probably never should have been fired up in the first place.”

But he and several other local lawmakers said the money for INTEC could be revived during budget negotiations over the next two weeks.

“I think we’ve got a 60 to 65 percent chance of getting it in,” said Sen. Brad Benson, R-Spokane.

INTEC began in 2000 as a nonprofit group to train skilled workers for high-tech firms. State lawmakers backed it with $1 million in 2001 and 2002 and another $970,000 in 2003 and 2004. Spokane County and private businesses also contribute, said Benson, an INTEC board member.

“The genius of this thing is if you think where the state’s mind was at (when it funded INTEC), it was willing to invest $1 million in an idea as an experiment to see where it might go,” INTEC CEO Lewis Rumpler said in a 2003 interview.

But the need for freshly trained battalions of high-tech workers dwindled with the recession in 2001.

Some local leaders, including then-Commissioner John Roskelley and Mayor Jim West, questioned in 2003 whether INTEC was effective. It looked like it was “trying to find something to do,” West told The Spokesman-Review at the time. “All I see from it is a lot of cheerleading.”

Rumpler, who was in Olympia on Wednesday for an 11th-hour pitch to lawmakers, did not return messages left at his office or on his cell phone Wednesday and Thursday.

The group’s lobbyist, Tom Parker, said INTEC was surprised and disappointed.

“We’re still confident that the money will be there in the end,” said Parker, noting that the final budget is still being fine-tuned.

Per capita, downtown Spokane is one of the poorest areas in the state, he said. Having a one-stop-shopping agency for work force training makes good sense.

No matter how the state money shakes out, INTEC’s Connect Northwest program – funded by $300,000 from Spokane County – will continue, said Bill Kalivas, vice president of business development for INTEC. The program, started a year ago, gives support and advice to new, struggling or expanding companies.

Kalivas declined to comment on the state budget proposals for INTEC.

The group does, however, have defenders in Olympia.

“It can play a complementary, not a duplicative, role” with community colleges, organized labor, chambers of commerce and other economic development groups, said Rep. Timm Ormsby, D-Spokane.

“INTEC has become one of the driving forces for economic development in Spokane,” said Benson. INTEC is particularly good at regional cooperation with Idaho and Tri-Cities groups, he said. “I still think they add value.”

As the economy recovers and companies grow, he said, INTEC will demonstrate its value.

Rep. John Ahern, R-Spokane, is another supporter.

“It’s part of Spokane,” he said. “Whatever it takes to keep Spokane on the forefront of technology, I think, is good.”

Wood said he, Ormsby and others are trying to get at least partial funding in the final version of the budget.

“You just lower your expectations and try,” he said.

The region’s most powerful lawmaker, Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown, said she’s not sure how things will play out.

“You just don’t get everything you want,” said Brown, D-Spokane. “I’d like to give it some thought to see if there’s any way we could still provide it (the money), but I’m not going to say for a fact that I think that could happen. … It’s definitely up in the air.”