Weekly unemployment claims fell last week, continuing a downward trend since a spike at the end of 2009. They are now well below levels from a year ago. For the week of February 13, 2010, there were 821 new regular benefit claims for Unemployment Insurance, a decrease of 126 from the week before. Altogether 14,658 new and continuing claims were filed, a decrease of 168 from a week ago and 2,383 fewer than a year earlier. The Department also processed 4997 First Tier claims for benefits under Emergency Unemployment Compensation, 2008 (EUC08), 48 fewer than a week ago. In addition, there were 3,552 Second Tier claims for benefits processed under the EUC08 program, which is an increase of 74 from the week before. The Unemployment Weekly Report can be found at: http://www.vtlmi.info/. Previously released Unemployment Weekly Reports and other UI reports can be found at: http://www.vtlmi.info/lmipub.htm#uc