Workforce Development Board Meeting Minutes for Wednesday November 19th, 2025

WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT BOARD OF ROCK ISLAND, HENRY AND MERCER COUNTIES,
NOT-FOR-PROFIT CORPORATION
Board Meeting
Minutes
8:30 a. m. – 9:30 a. m., Wednesday, November 19, 2025
In-Person

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Present: Al Zwilling, Steve Walzer, Tim Foster, Liz Hogan-Wells, Meg Pfoutz, Abbey Cox, Teresa Cherry, Mark Evans, Christine Caves, and Richard Nagle

Call to Order: Meeting was called to order at 8:31 AM

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Action Items

• Approval of Minutes- The minutes of 8-27-2025 were reviewed and a motion to approve was made by Meg Pfoutz and seconded by Al Zwilling. The minutes were approved with no corrections made.

• Fiscal Agent reports-Teresa Cherry presented the financial statements for the period ending 9-30-2025. The WIOA Formula grant 2024 in the amount of $2,311,305 which currently has $1,679,095.46 in funds spent and another $446,228.56 is obligated to be spent and has a remaining balance of $185,980.98 to be spent by 6-30-2026. The WIOA Formula grant 2025 in the amount of $2,715,441.00 which currently has $168,539.19 is obligated to be spent and has a remaining balance of $2,546,901.81 to be spent by 6-30-2027. A Pre-Apprenticeship dated 1-1-2024 and expires 12-31-2025 grant in the amount of $569,000 of which $365,199.48 funds spent, with another $1,117.11 obligated with $202,683.41 to spent by 12-31-2025. Teresa Cherry also stated that the organization just finally received $145,000 in reimbursements from that State of Illinois for past due reimbursements for The Pre-Apprenticeship Grant. The JTED grant in the amount of $562,325.00 which is to be used only on individuals from the re-entry from Prison that currently has spent $274,975.40, and another $42,317.49 is obligated to be spent and has a remaining balance of $245,032.31 to be spent by 6-30-2026. In addition to those grants, the organization has a 1E grant in the amount of $342,225.00 for the purpose of training workers laid off in the Quad Cities which currently has spent $234,036.11 with another $4,796.85 obligated to be spent and remaining balance of $103,391.94 to be spent by 12-31-2025. Teresa Cherry also stated that there are 3 new grants effective 7-1-2025 and they are as follows: Supplemental State Funding in the amount of $71,988.00 of which $1,371.31 has been spent and has a remaining balance of $70,616.69 by 6-30-2026.This grant will be used to hire a GED Educator to travel around the 3 counties with Mac books and educate individuals looking to earn a GED. A new Apprenticeship Expansion Grant in the amount of $145,000.00 of which $21,687.98 has been spent and has a remaining balance of $123,312.02 by 6-30-2026. A motion to approve was made by Al Zwilling, seconded by Meg Pfoutz to approve the financial statements as presented.

• Fiscal Policy Changes-We thoroughly discussed the fiscal policy changes with most of the changes being immaterial changes, however the committee asked that a disclaimer be made by every Fiscal associate to make it clear that it applies to the entire document and not just one section on the Fiscal Policy. A motion to approve was made by Meg Pfoutz, seconded by Christine Caves to approve with the added language above.

Reports

• Programmatic performance – Teresa Cherry presented the 9-30-2025 preliminary performance goals for the organization have been reviewed with 10 of 15 performance goals are a Fail. The State is implementing a new performance goal system and there appears to be a lot of problems with getting the data transferred over. The State of Illinois is fully aware of the situation and is actively trying to correct.

• Update Youth of 2024-2025 Providers-Teresa Cherry provided an update that our organization has taken over the High Roads program in Mercer County. She stated that they currently have 16 students, and the program is going very well since the organization brought the program in house. In addition, Black Hawk College just lost another career planner as that individual took another job within the college. Liz Hogan-Wells stated that the college has had 6 or 7 different career planners in the last 10 years. Teresa Cherry and Lori Warren are in current discussions with Black Hawk College to see if the organization can bring the career planning program in house as we already do most of the training for the career planner. If agreed to between our organization and Black Hawk College, our career planner would initially work part time at the college and part time in our office. Our organization and Black Hawk College are currently discussing of redoing the existing contract and make the two organizations working as a partnership instead of a contract obligation.

Additions- Abbey Cox mentioned that there is a company in Kewanee, Illinois that will be laying off several employees as of 12-1-2025 and our organization will be doing a rapid response meeting this week. Abbey Cox also mentioned that IDES is planning a couple of career days in Kewanee in January 2026 to hopefully help these individuals. She further stated that they are trying to get organizations that might be laying off to use the Work Share Program which a lot of employers do not understand. The program is in place to help an employer from a full layoff of an individual to reducing their hours to a certain number of hours and the Work Share Program would pay the difference from the reduced hours to the individuals normal work hours. Abbey Cox also discussed the new changes to the SNAP program which requires some amount of volunteer hours to receive their benefits and looking for places where these individuals can volunteer. Al Zwilling suggested looking at the rural communities as most of the Fire and Ambulance services are voluntary. These individuals can receive credits for these volunteer hours towards a EMR of EMT are they receive some training.

Public Comment: Richard Nagle presented a four-page Analytics on the activity since he redid our website 90 days ago. A few highlights are there have been 23,000 hits to the Website and that interestingly 64% of those hits have come from a desktop computer and not a phone. Richard has made the website more attractive for individuals to look at plus it helps get the word out on the services our organization provides.

Adjournment: Meeting adjourned at 9:20 AM, a motion to adjourn was made by Meg Pfoutz and seconded by Al Zwilling.

Next Board Meeting is February 25, 2026, at 8:30 AM