Unemployed California workers should begin receiving an extra $300 in weekly unemployment payments starting in early September, a state labor agency disclosure that provides a welcome counterpoint to the dreary economic woes unleashed by the coronavirus.
The additional unemployment payments are being provided to states nationwide through the U.S. government’s Lost Wages Assistance Program that is tapping funds from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
The $300 federal payment would be on top of the regular state unemployment benefits distributed by the Employment Development Department.
“The EDD will begin processing Lost Wages Assistance payments in phases for eligible individuals in the week beginning Sept. 7, 2020,” the EDD said in a disclosure that was tucked away at the end of the agency’s regular release that provides weekly updates on unemployment claims and payments.
Since state and local government agencies imposed wide-ranging shutdowns of businesses in California starting in mid-March, a jaw-dropping 7.9 million California workers have filed first-time claims for unemployment benefits.
The EDD envisions two major phases for the $300 payments.
“The first phase will cover claimants who previously provided information that they were unemployed due to a COVID-19 related reason on their initial application,” the EDD said.
The $300 supplement means a worker with the maximum state payment of $450 a week could receive $750 a week. A worker receiving the average EDD payment of $287 could receive a weekly payment of $587.
To receive the extra money, jobless workers must qualify for at least $100 in weekly state unemployment benefits, the EDD said.
Typically, jobless workers who applied for benefits in mid-March would have been asked questions about whether they lost their jobs or suffered reduced hours due to a reason linked to the coronavirus.
“The second phase will cover claimants who did not have the opportunity to indicate they were unemployed due to a COVID-19 reason on their initial application and still meet the minimum $100 weekly benefit amount eligibility requirement,” the EDD stated.
The EDD is mired in a mammoth backlog to pay jobless workers, a problem unleashed by the state agency’s broken call center and glitch-hobbled computer system that is based on a programming language that is at least 30 years old.
The embattled state agency has failed to provide firm estimates about the size of the backlog and precisely when it will catch up to the unpaid claims that require a response.
An estimated 1.13 million California workers might be due money from the EDD but are instead stuck in the state agency’s bureaucratic limbo.
The EDD has only said that it hopes to catch up with payments to 239,000 workers whose claims are “awaiting EDD response.”
Another 889,000 workers could potentially be owed payments by the EDD, but the state agency is demanding that the workers provide further information before the claims can be processed.
The labor agency will send jobless workers notifications that urge them to self-certify — assert — that they became unemployed due to coronavirus-linked disruptions.
“The EDD will be notifying claimants by email, SMS text message, or by mail to gather this information in mid-September,” the state agency said.
