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State Won't Offer Unemployment Benefits To Furloughed Federal Workers

Daniel Konik

Around 7,000 federal workers in Ohio aren’t receiving paychecks because of the government shutdown. And none of them will be offered unemployment checks from the state either.

The DeWine administration said the Department of Job and Family Services has advised against offering jobless benefits because the state could be penalized for not following the federal rules – which will translate to a tax hike on businesses that pay into unemployment.

And DeWine spokesman Dan Tierney also said those benefits would have to be taken back from those workers eventually.

“It would be unfair for us to have to go out and ask them to repay money that they would have received from this because they will be receiving the back pay at some point,” Tierney said.

Tierney also said the state couldn’t process unemployment benefits with computers or equipment paid for by the federal government.

Three states have said they’ll defy the federal rules and offer workers jobless benefits.

Copyright 2020 The Statehouse News Bureau. To see more, visit The Statehouse News Bureau.

Karen is a lifelong Ohioan who has served as news director at WCBE-FM, assignment editor/overnight anchor at WBNS-TV, and afternoon drive anchor/assignment editor in WTAM-AM in Cleveland. In addition to her daily reporting for Ohio’s public radio stations, she’s reported for NPR, the BBC, ABC Radio News and other news outlets. She hosts and produces the Statehouse News Bureau’s weekly TV show “The State of Ohio”, which airs on PBS stations statewide. She’s also a frequent guest on WOSU TV’s “Columbus on the Record”, a regular panelist on “The Sound of Ideas” on ideastream in Cleveland, appeared on the inaugural edition of “Face the State” on WBNS-TV and occasionally reports for “PBS Newshour”. She’s often called to moderate debates, including the Columbus Metropolitan Club’s Issue 3/legal marijuana debate and its pre-primary mayoral debate, and the City Club of Cleveland’s US Senate debate in 2012.
Karen Kasler
Contact Karen at 614/578-6375 or at kkasler@statehousenews.org.
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