Extra help for unemployed workers from the state and federal governments will begin drying up in the next few weeks.
Washington state’s Employment Security Department said Friday that the state’s extended benefits program, aimed at laid-off workers who have exhausted other unemployment aid, will end Jan. 10.
The state’s extended benefits program has given an additional nine weeks of help for workers who have gone through the regular state benefits and federal extended benefits.
But federal funding for the program is tied to the state’s unemployment rate, said Kristin Alexander, spokeswoman for the Employment Security Department. Extended Benefits became available in Washington at the start of 2002 as a result of the state’s sharply increased unemployment rate.
While this fall’s statewide unemployment rate still hovered above last year’s level, it was less than 10 percent higher, triggering the end of the program.
The action affects an estimated 7,000 to 7,500 people statewide, according to the state. In Snohomish County, 998 people received the extended benefits for the week ended Dec. 6, the most recent figures available. In Island County, 45 people received those benefits.
At the same time, the federal Temporary Emergency Unemployment Compensation program is set to expire this weekend.
Approved by Congress in March 2002, that program has provided up to 13 weeks of federal aid to the unemployed. But Congress adjourned for the year without extending the benefits further.
On Friday, U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell and U.S. Rep. Rick Larsen, both Democrats, criticized the Republican-controlled Congress for not reauthorizing the benefits. Cantwell said she has sent a letter to President Bush asking him to extend the federal program.
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