Vermont to discontinue extended unemployment benefits

As a result of the decline in Vermont’s unemployment rate, the Vermont Department of Labor (VDOL) announced today that it will discontinue paying Federal-State extended unemployment compensation program benefits effective the week ending July 10, 2010. The May unemployment rate was 6.2% bringing Vermont’s three month average unemployment rate down to 6.4 percent, below the 6.5 percent federal and state threshold required to establish extended Unemployment compensation benefits (EB). The EB program was designed to provide up to 13 additional weeks of unemployment benefits during periods of high unemployment to individuals who exhaust regular state unemployment benefits. This means no EB payments will be made after the week ending July 10, 2010. Claimants impacted will be mailed a notice shortly advising of the end of their benefits.
“Federal and state law contains provisions describing when state extended benefits trigger on and when they trigger off.” commented Labor Commissioner, Patricia Moulton Powden. “The good news is we continue to see a reduction in unemployment with the trends pointing to slow but steady job growth. We are hopeful these trends continue,” added the commissioner.
At this time, Congress has still not acted on authorizing new entitlement under the federal Emergency Unemployment Compensation (EUC) program. As a reminder, EUC has three tiers for which Vermont qualified. Each of the tiers have various caps, with tier 1 providing up to 20 weeks, tier 2 up to 14 weeks and tier 3 providing up to 13 weeks. While individuals are still receiving EUC payments under their current tier, absent Congress taking action, we are not authorized to establish new EUC tier entitlement. Qualifying new unemployment claimants will still be able to collect regular unemployment benefits of up to 26 weeks.
VDOL’s 12 career resource centers and satellite offices continue to provide Vermonters assistance with job seeking skills and strategies including a compilation of occupational data for those interested in career changes or new entrants to the workforce. In addition, the Department is continues their collaboration with Community College of Vermont to offer the Career Readiness Certificate training, free of charge, to Vermonters interested in bolstering their work readiness skills. The Department has a variety of federal and state training programs to assist unemployed individuals seeking work and/or employers needing to train new hires. Regional career resource staff can assist folks interested in learning more about these opportunities.
Source: Vermont DOL. 6.30.2010