TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – Tim Alford, director of Alabama’s Office of Workforce Development, will be the luncheon speaker at the 2006 Economic Outlook Conference, presented by The University of Alabama's Center for Business and Economic Research. The conference is scheduled for Tuesday, Jan. 24 at the Embassy Suites Hotel in Montgomery.

The Office of Workforce Development has been charged with improving coordination and the achieving of four objectives under the Workforce Investment Act: increasing accountability, streamlining services, providing universal access to services, and empowering individuals in training and career choices.

As its new director, Alford brings years of workforce experience to the office. He has worked in the education field as a teacher, principal, and a dean at a community college. After retiring from education, Alford started a consulting business working with companies such as Michelin and Chrysler to design, develop and deliver workforce development programs. He has served on job training coordination councils and on Workforce Investment Act boards. Alford was the founding executive director of a public/private economic development corporation in Enterprise and resigned as mayor of Enterprise to accept the position to head the new office.

Alford has been assigned by Gov. Bob Riley to consolidate state workforce development programs into a single office. Before Alford was hired, there were seven different state agencies administering more than $100 million in federal workforce security and development funds. Various programs of workforce development were handled by the Alabama Department of Economic and Community Affairs, the Department of Industrial Relations, the Department of Human Resources, the Department of Rehabilitative Services, the Department of Children’s Affairs, the Department of Education and the Alabama Postsecondary Education System.

Following a welcome by Dr. J. Barry Mason, dean of the Culverhouse College of Commerce, Nigel Gault, managing director, North American Macroeconomic Service, Global Insight, will present the United State economic outlook.

Carl Ferguson, director of the Center for Business and Economic Research, will address the Alabama outlook.

Conference sponsors this year include Alabama Power Co.; BlueCross/BlueShield of Alabama; Boeing Co.; Business Council of Alabama; Compass Bank; Hyundai Motor Manufacturing Alabama; Sterne, Agee & Leach Inc.; United Parcel Service; and Vulcan Materials Co.

The conference registration fee is $95, which includes the Alabama Economic Outlook 2006, conference materials and lunch.

For more information call 205/348-6191 or e-mail uacber@cba.ua.edu.

CBER is Alabama's central reservoir for business, economic and demographic data. Since its creation in 1930, CBER has engaged in research programs to promote economic development in the state, while continuously expanding and refining its broad base of socioeconomic information. To forecast the level of activity in Alabama, CBER developed an econometric model of the state. Beginning in 1980, output from the model has been published in the annual Alabama Economic Outlook series.

Visit CBER on the web at: http://cber.cba.ua.edu