Austin mayor announces new infrastructure academy to build construction workforce

Editor’s note: The above video shows KXAN News’ top morning headlines from Wednesday, Feb. 28, 2024.

AUSTIN (KXAN) — Austin Mayor Kirk Watson announced Wednesday plans for a new infrastructure academy to help build a local pipeline of workers for major construction and transportation projects in the region.

It’s tied to an agenda item that the city council will take up March 7.

According to the resolution, the Austin Infrastructure Academy would be a “one-of-a-kind public-private infrastructure network that integrates recruitment, a comprehensive training hub, childcare support, and placement services to connect local people to career pathways in infrastructure development.”

The academy will do things like:

• align training programs with in-demand skills
• offer childcare and other wraparound services to eliminate participation barriers
• facilitate the matching of trained job seekers with job creators

The mayor told KXAN the goal is to build a physical building for people to go to and get these services. He said it’ll be funded in a variety of ways.

“Set aside funding from the different projects that are being done,” Watson said. “Federal funding, the bipartisan infrastructure bill specifically looks to workforce development and how local communities go about workforce development.”

Watson said the resolution will direct the city manager to begin the process of putting all this together.

The need for workers

The mayor said there are a number of large infrastructure projects that need thousands of workers.

“About $25 billion worth of infrastructure projects,” Watson said. “Everything from expanding the airport, Project Connect, the Light Rail to I-35. The challenge is we don’t have enough workforce to do that.”

Watson said the city is going to need to grow its construction workforce capacity by 81% through 2040.

“We need about 10,000 workers a year doing this sort of work,” Watson said. “Which means we need to increase our training and upskill folks by about 4,000 people a year.”

KXAN’s Sarah Al-Shaikh will have more on this story at 5 p.m.

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