Labor Committee Identifies 4 Ways to Improve Common Unemployment Insurance Problems

On March 11th, Councilmember Elissa Silverman, chair of the DC Council's Labor and Workforce Development Committee, sent a letter highlighting four ways for the District to resolve unemployment insurance issues.  The letter, to the Department of Employment Services Director Unique Morris-Hughes, comes after the Department's performance oversight hearing, where councilmembers heard from dozens of witnesses who spent hours and hours calling and emailing the Department but could not get issues resolved.

The four areas identified in the letter are:

• Plan a 30-day staffing blitz to process all remaining claims from 2020 and reduce the claims backlog 
• Proactively reach out to Pandemic Unemployment Assistance recipients to encourage them to ask for a higher weekly benefit amount
• Host a regional meeting with representatives from Maryland and Virginia to resolve out-of-state wage issues
• Communicate any changes in unemployment compensation programs from new Biden Administration COVID package

You can read the full letter here.