MADISON, Wis. — Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers says he doesn’t care who gets the credit for modernizing the state’s unemployment insurance system — he just wants it done.
The governor’s office says he sent a letter to the legislature urging “immediate, biapartisan action” to update the decades-old system that led to a backlog of people not getting unemployment benefits during the pandemic.
The governor called for a special session to address the unemployment system during his State of the State Address. Last month, the Department of Workforce Development walked the public through the system to show the problems with the software, which was developed in the 1970s.
“My proposal to update our antiquated system to date has been met with the same continued inaction Wisconsinites have seen for years during previous administrations and more than a decades’ worth of state legislators that knew this system was outdated and failed to fix it,” Gov. Evers said in his letter to the legislature. “And worse yet, it has also become the subject of partisan, political posturing and finger pointing unfitting of the severity of this problem and the urgency with which it must be addressed.”
Evers says it would be “callous and irresponsible” for any elected official to not address the issue before the next big economic crisis, especially after the Legislative Fiscal Bureau projected the state to collected more than $1 billion more in revenue over the next few years than originally projected.
“This problem and the people we serve cannot and should not have to wait. Again. And here’s the bottom line: I don’t care who gets the credit, I just want to get it done,” Evers said in his letter.
The Department of Workforce Development says it has received 8.8 million unemployment claims since the COVID-19 pandemic started last March.
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