Day 10: READY! SET! (go)?

Finally!  In this race we call the 120-day regular session, we heard a bill in Commerce and Labor addressing something important: the unemployment insurance/Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program debacle.  And it showed us that the people in charge seem to be sitting in their lounge chairs rather than being on the track. 

The bill, SB75, regarding the Department of Employment, Training, and Rehabilitation (DETR) and their handling of payment of unemployment insurance and gig-worker benefits, is a travesty.  The bill they proposed did not address the real problems real people are having getting the benefits they paid for.  We call this Unemployment “Insurance.”  But unlike insurance companies, though we all pay premiums into it, the State cannot be held responsible for their lack of responsiveness and refusal to pay claims without proven justification.

What was particularly surprising was their attitude. They were taking a victory lap despite the fact that thousands of people are facing imminent financial ruin without the help of the unemployment insurance benefits they paid for or the money from the federal government sent to Nevada for them.  They showed total indifference toward those that have submitted claims but have not yet received their benefits.  In the name of “fraud” they said that their knee-jerk refusal to pay saved the state hundreds of millions of dollars – or more. Their reasoning was that they saved millions of dollars by depriving thousands of their rightful benefits, so it was all justified.  Of course, by that measure, we would save millions more if we stopped paying DETR management their salaries.

Moreover, federal law requires DETR to provide the unemployed worker seeking benefits notice and a hearing (i.e. “due process”) before they deny the benefits.  That’s not what DETR has been doing.  They admitted they have anywhere between 200,000 and half-a-million Nevadan’s claims that have not been paid and have not had a hearing.  People are despondent, even committing suicide, yet DETR doesn’t have a bill proposed to fix the problems.  In fact, the bill they brought appears merely to seek to protect themselves, to make information harder to get, and to raise premiums employers pay to bail them out of their self-inflicted problem. 

But DETR has sat idly by, and failed to address the structural problems within the department.  DETR has had two official independent reports handed to them, one by Special Master Jason Guinasso, and one by former Speaker Barbara Buckley, that have outlined recommendations for improvements - none of which were addressed in DETR’s bill – the only one they intend to bring this session.  In other words, they told the half-million Nevadans who have yet to see the benefits to which they are entitled that if they lacked bread, let them eat cake.

I don’t see how this Administration could be more tone-deaf to the chorus of cries of their constituents. So while thousands are stuck without the help they paid for, our executives are patting themselves on the back for how much money they didn’t send out.  It’s heartbreaking. 

(Photo credit: Rachel Aston/The Guardian, April 21, 2017.)