WAC Alert
June 6, 2003

Governor and Speaker of the House Poised to Gut Unemployment Insurance to Jobless

TAKE URGENT ACTION:
 Below is a summary of the latest report we are receiving on the deliberations to reform the Unemployment Insurance (UI) system and a behind closed doors deal that may result in radical cuts to UI
benefits. The below alert is from the Washington State Labor Council who the Washington Association of Churches has been working with closely on this issue. Please call the Governor's Office with the urgent message below!

Governor Locke's Office: (360) 902-4111
Speaker Frank Chopp's Office: (360) 786-7920 

MESSAGE: "OPPOSE BUSINESS LOBBYISTS' RADICAL REFORM of our state's U.I. Tax
system. DON'T GUT OUR U.I. SYSTEM without public disclosure and debate!" 

BACKGROUND: (From the Washington State Labor Council)
The WSLC has just learned that Democratic Governor Gary Locke and Democratic House Speaker Frank Chopp are still considering -- and MAY DECIDE TODAY -- whether to support a radical Association of Washington Business plan to completely gut the UI system. The foremost national expert on UI has analyzed the AWB plan and recommended against it, saying it will make out state's UI too unstable and volatile.

But even worse, the whole model becomes insolvent unless it is coupled with dramatic eligibility cuts that would immediately disqualify tens of thousands of Washington workers from benefits! Nobody except a handful of lobbyists and legislators even know exactly how the radical AWB plan will actually affect employer taxes! Their proposal keeps changing, but under recent drafts, tax rates would actually go UP for some employers! (But apparently not for the ones at the bargaining table.) This is all happening because of a frenzied scramble to convince Boeing to assemble it's 7E7 jet in the state. But organized labor has offered a significant UI reform package of its own that lowers employer taxes -- for
all employers -- and cuts UI benefits on the upper end of the scale in order to avoid completely cutting families from this important safety net. (Learn more. http://www.wslc.org/legis/lulatest.htm
 
And given the fact that lawmakers have only until Tuesday to pass reform -- or June 20 -- at the latest, it has the advantage of working within the current UI system and making necessary reforms. The AWB plan would rewrite the whole system with almost no public disclosure or debate!

ACTION ALERT: Please call the Governor's office RIGHT NOW (don't wait a single minute) at (360) 902-4111, and leave a message for Gov. Locke that you "OPPOSE BUSINESS LOBBYISTS' RADICAL REFORM of our state's U.I. Tax system. DON'T GUT OUR U.I. SYSTEM without public disclosure and debate!" Then call House Speaker Frank Chopp's office at (360) 786-7920 and tell him the same thing.
Then forward this message to everyone you know. Thank you.

Julie L. Watts
Church and Public Policy Program
Washington Association of Churches
419 Occidental Ave. South Suite, 201
Seattle WA, 98105-2886
(206) 625-9790 x 11
http://www.thewac.org