Board hears mixed timeliness data: field inventory rises to about 17,000 while appellate closures exceed DOL targets

The California Unemployment Insurance Appeals Board reviewed monthly workload figures on July 15, with agency officials reporting a small month-over-month rise in incoming appeals and continued use of the CAMS transfer system to even workloads across field offices.

Chief ALJ and executive director Michael Koutre said field offices closed 15,101 cases in June and that the appeals inventory grew by just over 2,500 cases to just over 17,000. Koutre said the agency moved 2,100 cases among field offices in June to speed hearings and that average case age in field operations remained about 31 days.

Koutre noted Department of Labor timeliness expectations and recent production trends: "The field office has closed 22 percent of cases within 30 days," he said, and "in June, we closed 65 percent within 45 days," which he said misses the DOL 60%-within-60-day and 80%-within-45-day targets for field operations.

Rebecca Bach, supervising administrative law judge for appellate operations, reported stronger second-level performance: in June the office closed 77.5% of cases within 45 days and 96.1% within 75 days, with a case-aging average of 21.9 days at the end of June. "The second-level numbers are very solid," Bach told the board.

Board members asked about legacy-case handling and the recent uptick in case transfers. Koutre said the agency has had seven ALJ separations this year (mostly retirements) and that transfers will remain a primary tool until staffing stabilizes; he estimated 1,000–2,000 monthly transfers could be typical while hiring and regional adjustments proceed.

No formal changes to policy or staffing were adopted at the meeting; officials said they will continue to monitor timeliness metrics and use hiring or case-transfer strategies as levers to address discrepancies.