Dems Urge PA Senate to Extend Unemployment Benefits

State Democratic officials today urged the quick passage of a bill that would tap federal stimulus benefits to extend benefits for another 7 weeks to more than 17,000 unemployed Pennsylvanians. The measure, which passed the House 197-1, has been stalled in the Senate Labor and Industry Committee for more than a week.

Governor Ed Rendell joined Senator Christina Tartaglione (D-Phila) and others in touting the legislation. He says Republicans gave him three reasons they didn’t want to pass the bill.

“Number one, because I didn’t ask them. If that was the criteria, we’d have had a budget on June 30… Second reason was there would be costs to Philadelphia and Allegheny County that would be self-insured. Those costs would be less than $5000… and the third reason that was offered was they wanted to make this part of a package where we would buttress the turndown in our unemployment compensation fund."

He says while a $300 check might not seem like a lot, it could mean the difference between food on the table or not.
Rendell says in all, the benefits offered by the federal government would total over $145 million, at a cost of about $400,000 to the state.
Senate Labor and Industry Committee Chairman John Gordner agrees the bill is important. But, the Republican says he just recently got the opportunity to view it for the first time.

"I've had it in my committee for one week, and just in order to make sure that we understand all of the consequences of it -- especially as it relates to additional costs for the state, additional costs for municipalities, additional costs for school districts -- we're just doing our due diligence on it."

Gordner adds people whose benefits have already been exhausted would still be eligible for an extension, whenever the bill passes.