Dec 8, 2020 3 min read

In her first full week on the job, Jennifer Berrier, acting secretary of the state Labor & Industry Department, repeated a plea often expressed by her predecessor, Jerry Oleksiak, who retired on Friday.

Help us, Congress.

Accompanied by state Human Services Secretary Teresa Miller, Berrier opened her first weekly virtual news conference by saying, “Secretary Miller and I and Gov. Tom Wolf urge extensions of or replacements for the PUA and PEUC programs. Without them, a half-million Pennsylvanians and their families will lose benefits, lose the ability to pay for food, their home, their medications.”

Congress may be getting closer to passing a stimulus package, which would provide great relief nationwide for recipients of Pandemic Unemployment Assistance or Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation benefits. Those unemployment compensation programs provide payments to workers who have been displaced from their jobs – part time or full time – by the coronavirus pandemic. PUA and PEUC, however, are scheduled to expire Dec. 31.

Yet a stimulus package is not a given, and the benefits have been a lifeline.

PUA provides up to 39 weeks of unemployment benefits to individuals who not eligible for regular UC, such as independent contractors and gig workers. Berrier said there are 400,000-plus PUA recipients in Pennsylvania.

That program, in recent months, has been inundated by fraud cases in multiple states – including Pennsylvania.

PEUC likewise is a temporary program that provides up to 13 weeks of benefits to individuals who have exhausted their 20 weeks of regular UC benefits. The acting secretary estimated that there are 109,000 such claimants in the Keystone State.

Both programs were created in late March through the federal CARES Act, and have provided much-needed relief to eligible claimants who lost work because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Miller discussed two Department of Human Services public assistance programs that can help Pennsylvanians in need, including SNAP and Medicaid.

SNAP is the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, a federally funded program that assists residents in buying food. Eligible low-income residents receive an Electronic Benefits Transfer ACCESS Card to make food purchases.

Medicaid provides health coverage for low-income citizens.

Miller said people are applying for assistance, but not at a volume she anticipated, considering the health crisis.

“We’re working with the University of Pittsburgh to find out why more people aren’t applying,” she said. “People may feel they don’t need assistance or they may get a job soon.

“These are programs people need during times like what we are facing. They can be a bridge that can be used for a few months.”

She recommended Pennsylvanians visit www.compass.state.pa.us/.