To establish and fund a community agricultural worker safety grant program. The bill seeks to create occupational training opportunities for agricultural workers. The program would be administered by the Washington Department of Agriculture.   Official Text and Analysis.

To replace the Engrossed Senate Bill. The amended bill requires a competitive grant program administered by the WSDA instead of identifying the Opportunities Industrialization Center of Washington as the grant recipient. The amended bill specifically requires the grant recipient to work with specific stakeholders to develop training in certain subject matters. The amended bill requires the Department to monitor the effectiveness of any training developed and provided and to report to the Legislature. The amended bill changes the expiration date to July 1, 2009, instead of July 1, 2012.

To create the community agricultural worker safety grant program, to be implemented by the 501(c)(3) nonprofit opportunities industrialization center of Washington. As grant recipient, the center shall work with the agricultural industry to provide practical, hands-on training for the state's agricultural workers in tractor and farm machinery skills and safety, pesticide training, adult basic skills, civics, English as a second language, commercial drivers' licensing, and other related topics. The grant recipient may receive up to two hundred fifty thousand dollars per year.

To provide for the WSDA to conduct a competitive grant process to award a grant of up to $250,000 per year to a nonprofit organization to develop and provide practical, hands-on training for the state's agricultural workers. The competitive grant program takes effect July 1, 2009. .The amended bill also adds the reporting requirement, under which the WSDA must report to the appropriate committees of the Legislature by December 1 of each year beginning in 2008, on the implementation of agricultural worker safety training pursuant to: (1) the budget proviso in the 2007-08 Operating Budget providing the WSDA pass-through funding to the OIC; and (2) the competitive grant program, as appropriate.