Trade group: Jobless aid deal ups states’ ‘burden’

A major trade group representing state unemployment insurance directors says that a proposed agreement to extend jobless benefits retroactively could see some states opting out of the program.

In a letter circulated by Speaker John Boehner’s office on Wednesday, the National Association of State Workforce Agencies (NASWA) said the tentative Senate deal, if passed, would “substantially increase the administrative burden on states.”

{mosads}A bipartisan group of senators last week announced an agreement to restore long-term emergency unemployment benefits that lapsed in late December.

The deal would extend the program for five months and provide retroactive payments to recipients eligible earlier in the year. The $9.7 billion proposal would be offset with savings elsewhere, and it would prohibit anyone with an adjusted gross income of $1 million or more in the previous year from receiving benefits.

The trade group has not taken a formal position on the agreement, but its letter on Wednesday raised a number of concerns.

“The requirements in S. 2148 would cause considerable delays in the implementation of the program, and increased administrative issues and costs,” NASWA President Mark Henry wrote to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). “Some states have indicated they might decide such changes are not feasible in the short time available, and therefore would consider not signing the U.S. Department of Labor’s agreement to operate the program.”

Henry said the legislation could take a majority of states between one and three months to implement, further delaying benefits for recipients. And he suggested the “millionaire provision” and the backdating of claims to Dec. 29 would be unworkable.

The Senate could vote on the bill as soon as next week when it returns from a recess.

It faces an even more difficult path in the House, where Boehner has said any extension of unemployment benefits must be paid for and accompanied by separate job-creation measures.

On Wednesday the Speaker highlighted the NASWA letter and called the Senate bill “unworkable.”

“The serious problems with the Senate legislation being noted by these state directors – the state employees charged with actually implementing the Senate unemployment insurance legislation if it were to become law – are cause for serious concern,” Boehner said. “We have always said that we’re willing to look at extending emergency unemployment benefits again, if Washington Democrats can come up with a plan that is fiscally responsible, and gets to the root of the problem by helping to create more private-sector jobs. There is no evidence that the bill being rammed through the Senate by Leader Reid meets that test, and according to these state directors, the bill is also simply unworkable.”

Drew Hammill, a spokesman for House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), suggested Boehner was using the letter from the state directors as an excuse to oppose an extension of unemployment benefits.

“Obviously, the administration would have to issue guidance to the states as has been done in past extensions,” Hammill said. “Using these relatively minor concerns to continue to justify leaving more than two million people out in the cold further illustrates that unemployed Americans are invisible to House Republicans.”

–This report was updated at 4:33 p.m.