Fortunately, the Senate place S 391 on special order yesterday. S 391 will reform the ESC. This should have been done a long time ago. They stopped prosecuting fraudulent claims: The Legislative Audit Council release their report yesterday. Here’s a few shocking items in the report. To read the full report click or the summary click.
$171 million were given to folks who were fired for cause. Here’s a few examples:
An employee made unauthorized charges on his company’s credit card, which included motel rooms, hardware, and internet dating charges. He was terminated by the company, but ESC still allowed him to collect $3,586 in unemployment benefits.
An employee made a job-related threat and alluded to a weapon in his car. Police found a loaded firearm in the employee’s car. He was terminated for cause, but still collected $2,440 in unemployment benefits.In February 2008, the agency stopped referring for criminal prosecution claimants who had fraudulently obtained unemployment benefits. In FY 08-09, the agency identified more than $7.3 million that was lost due to claimant fraud. In all seven fraud cases we examined, the claimants knowingly withheld information to obtain or increase their unemployment benefits; each case had overpayments totaling over $10,000.
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