Committee accepts Senate language to exempt workers at employers under verified extended shutdowns, asks for updated wording

The Ways and Means committee accepted the Senate position on two Department of Labor items and asked staff to provide revised language that would exempt employees at employers under a verified extended shutdown from certain reemployment- and work-search requirements, committee members said at the meeting.

Committee members said the change is intended to apply to workers at operations such as General Motors during an employer-verified extended shutdown and to avoid increasing cost pressure on the state unemployment insurance trust fund.

Senator Masherson, sponsor of the language, told the committee that the exemption would apply only to employees covered by collective bargaining and in a verified extended shutdown. "What that language would do to exempt them from the work requirement, it has no cost to the fund because they would only qualify for this traditional unemployment and then GM picks up the balance of the cost," Masherson said. "We verified that in the break because there was some question around whether or not that was accurate...there'd be 0 effect to the trust." Masherson said updated, codifying language was expected to be provided to the committee.

Vice Chair Williams raised a fiscal concern about the proposal's cost estimate, saying it looked like a "$25,000,000 fiscal note versus what our statute would be, which would be about $6,000,000 fiscal note." "We just don't want this unemployment insurance to be heavily underwater," Williams said, adding the committee should avoid shifting large costs to other sponsors.

Members asked staff to produce the updated draft language so the committee could review the statutory text before finalizing the measure; one committee member said the updated language should be available "tomorrow."

Discussion points and next steps recorded by the committee distinguish the policy change from eligibility for unemployment insurance. Masherson emphasized the proposal "doesn't change their qualification for unemployment," only certain reemployment and job-search requirements.

Action: Committee accepted the Senate position on Department of Labor items 1 and 2 and requested updated statutory language to codify an exemption for workers at employers under a verified extended shutdown; staff to provide revised language to the committee the next day, per members' remarks.