ERP INSTITUTE PARTICIPANT

Vera “Jeanette” Dela Cruz is the Chief of Staff for the Labor Commissioner of the Texas Workforce Commission, Julian Alvarez III.  She is the policy and legal advisor to the Labor Commissioner in matters involving legislation, budget, information technology, unemployment insurance, civil rights, workforce policy (apprenticeship and job training) and interests related to the more than 14 million workers of Texas.  She has held the position as Chief of Staff since 2016. 

 

She handles external communications on behalf of the Commissioner and the Labor office with state legislators, the public and constituent groups such as the North American and Texas State Building Trades, Apprenticeship and Training Advisory Committee of the Texas Workforce Investment Council, Community and Technical Colleges, K-12 School Districts and various associations.  She also manages social media on behalf of Commissioner Alvarez and outreach efforts. 

 

As COS, she manages the Labor office staff which includes the supervision of staff attorneys.  She oversees the processing of Unemployment Insurance; Tax cases, Wage Claim and Civil Rights cases argued on behalf of constituents of the Labor office.  

 

She works on special projects on behalf of the Labor Commissioner with an emphasis on the goals of the Tri-Agency partnership (Texas Education Agency, Texas Workforce Commission and Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board partnership to align education with the needs of industry); career and technical education and advancing registered apprenticeships in Texas in fields beyond the traditional skilled trades into IT, Healthcare and Cybersecurity.  She prepares Commissioner’s speeches, talking data points and manages his social media presence on Twitter. 

 

Prior to her employment with Commissioner Alvarez, “Jeanette” worked for the previous Labor Commissioner as a staff attorney reviewing UI, Wage Claim, Tax and Civil Rights cases and providing outreach to Worker’s Defense Project and the Dallas Consulado General de Mexico. 

 

She has worked in Higher and Lower Authority Appeals and was the Business Analyst for the Appeals Redesign project which transformed paper based system to an electronic file and scheduling systems for greater production and time lapse results. 

 

Jeanette is licensed to practice law in the state of Texas; obtained her J.D. from Texas Tech School of Law and obtained her Bachelor of Arts from the University of Texas at San Antonio.