Number of Kentuckians filing for unemployment skyrockets, doubling last week’s record

The number of people who filed for unemployment in Kentucky and across the U.S. continued to skyrocket last week, with 112,726 claims filed in Kentucky and 6,648,000 claims across the country, according to new data from the U.S. Department of Labor.

Both figures set new records for the number of claims filed in a single week, and more than doubled last week’s record-breaking numbers.

Just three weeks ago, Kentucky had 2,785 claims filed during a one-week period

The federal government’s stimulus bill allowed many more Americans to file for unemployment than are typically allowed, including independent contractors and gig-economy workers.

Following reports that Kentucky’s unemployment filing system had crashed several times under the swell of claims, Gov. Andy Beshear increased staffing levels at the office that handles claims. Still, many people reported problems as recently as Wednesday that have prevented them from filing for benefits.

During a press conference Wednesday, Beshear said “we haven’t been able to move fast enough.”

“That’s on us,” Beshear said. “It’s an unprecedented time, its an amount of claims we haven’t seen before, but you know what, it’s our job to fix it.”

Josh Benton, deputy secretary for the Cabinet of Education and Workforce Development, said the cabinet has increased its staffing from about 12 people to well over 120.

The phone line for unemployment insurance claims has received between 80,000 and 200,000 calls over the past three business days. Previous to the coronavirus outbreak, the line typically received about 1,000 calls a day, Benton said.

That spike has caused serious backlogs and left many applicants unable to file over the phone. Benton asked people to only call the line if they are having trouble filing online or need to reset their pin, rather than file their initial claim.

To check the status of a claim, Benton asked applicants to use the online portal.

“We’re going to be staffing up every day to make sure we can take the calls, but we really need to prioritize those specific individuals,” Benton said.

The state sent out more than 40,000 acceptance letters since Tuesday night to people who were originally and incorrectly told they were ineligible, Benton said.

So far, the state has issued over $18.5 million of claims to over 32,000 Kentuckians who filed the week of March 16, the first week the state saw significant increases because of the coronavirus.

Several workers who have filed in the weeks since, who have yet to receive benefits, reported struggling to pay bills on Wednesday — the first 1st of the month since the outbreak of the virus.

“I pay a house payment, I pay a car payment, I have insurance and electricity and water. It’s all of that that I’m just really worried about,” Ariel Johnson, a single mother of two who lost her restaurant job, told the Herald-Leader earlier this week. “I’m hoping right now that the unemployment will come through, and I’ll just cross those bridges as I come to it.”

This story was originally published April 2, 2020 at 10:12 AM.