CLEVELAND — The Ohio Department of Job and Family Services (ODJFS) reports that 61,083 Ohioans filed for unemployment for the week ending on May 2. That’s a drop from the 92,920 Ohioans who filed claims the week before.
Over the last seven weeks, 1,118,569 Ohioans filed jobless claims. That’s more than the combined total of 1,117,457 for the last three years.
ODJFS Director Kimberly Hall says more than 88% of those claims have been solved, meaning they've either been approved, denied, or otherwise withdrawn.
"We still have that delta though of pending claims, and that's our key area of focus," Hall said.
Nationally, at least 33 million Americans have lost their jobs in a seven-week span.
ODJFS has distributed more than $1.9 billion in unemployment compensation to more than 536,000 Ohioans.
The agency says it will not rest until all eligible Ohioans get their benefits, however Ohio's unemployment trust fund is quickly running out of money.
“We are, at this current pace, on track to deplete our state resources in the unemployment trust fund here by June with just with the unprecedented volume," Hall said.
Hall says when that happens the state will have to borrow money from the federal government - as it did during the great recession. She says odjfs finished paying off that loan in 2016 and that Congress may be looking at ways to adjust those terms for states during the crisis.
“It's not clear whether they will track exactly the way the terms were managed with the Great Recession, because of the, just the tremendous pressure on states right now. They may relax some of the repayment obligations," Hall said.
All eligible Ohioans will receive their unemployment benefits and any delays in processing their claims will not reduce the amount received, according to ODJFS.
RELATED: 92,920 Ohioans filed for unemployment last week, bringing 6-week total to over 1 million
