Unemployment Compensation

Passed

P HB96

Unemployment compensation; Indian tribes. Provides that unemployment compensation benefits based on service in the employ of an Indian tribe are payable to the same extent as benefits payable to other employees covered by the Virginia Unemployment Compensation Act. The measure provides Indian tribes with the option to make reimbursement payments to the unemployment trust fund, in lieu of tax payments, to the same extent currently allowed for local governments. If an Indian tribe fails to make required payments, the tribe will become liable for the FUTA tax and the Virginia Employment Commission may remove tribal services from unemployment coverage. SB 359 is identical.
Patron - Purkey

P HB366

Unemployment compensation; testing for controlled substances. Disqualifies an individual from receiving unemployment compensation benefits if he is discharged from employment as a result of a confirmed positive test for a nonprescribed controlled substance conducted in a United States Department of Transportation-qualified drug screen, conducted in accordance with an employer's bona fide drug policy. Currently, an individual is ineligible for unemployment benefits if he fails a drug test conducted in accordance with scientifically recognized standards by a laboratory accredited by the United States Department of Health and Human Services, or the College of American Pathology, or the American Association for Clinical Chemistry, or the equivalent.
Patron - Carrico

P HB547

Unemployment compensation; minimum earnings; maximum weekly benefit. Increases the wages an employee must have earned in the two highest earnings quarters of his base period in order to be eligible for unemployment benefits from $2,700 to $3,000 for claims effective on or after July 5, 2009. The measure also increases the maximum weekly unemployment compensation benefit from $363 to $378 for claims effective on or after July 6, 2008.
Patron - Nixon

P HB881

Virginia Employment Commission orders. Authorizes final orders of the Virginia Employment Commission (VEC) with respect to overpayments of unemployment benefits to be recorded, enforced and satisfied as orders or decrees of a circuit court upon certification of such orders by the Commissioner of the VEC.
Patron - Loupassi

P HB925

Virginia Employment Commission; employment stabilization. Requires the Virginia Employment Commission to provide Virginia State Job Service services, as described in Title 60.2, according to the provisions of the Wagner-Peyser Act (29 U.S.C. 49f), as amended by the Workforce Investment Act. SB 253 is identical.
Patron - Byron

P SB253

P SB359

Failed

F HB24

Virginia Employment Commission; employment office closures. Requires the Virginia Employment Commission to close Commonwealth-operated employment offices, if required to close any such offices as a result of reductions in the amount of Federal Unemployment Tax Act revenue distributed to the Commission for administration of the unemployment insurance program, in the order established by its ranking of such offices based on the unemployment rate in the political subdivision or subdivisions served by the office.
Patron - Marshall, D.W.

F HB599

Unemployment compensation; services not constituting employment. Provides that services performed by an individual on a temporary basis in several circumstances do not constitute "employment" for purposes of the Unemployment Compensation Act. The circumstances include situations where (i) the individual is aware prior to commencing the work assignment that its duration is for a specific period of time and acknowledges in writing that he will not be eligible for unemployment benefits with respect to the assignment; (ii) the individual has been released from incarceration within the preceding year or is a socially and economically disadvantaged individual and the temporary assignment is arranged by a staffing agency that cannot readily find continual work for the individual at the end of an initial assignment; (iii) his staffing or employment agency has subcontracted with a second staffing or employment agency that provides temporary workers to a client firm, and the subcontracting agency does not have the ability to supervise or control the performance of the individual's services; (iv) the services are performed for a small business or minority-owned business that is a temporary staffing agency with fewer than 1,000 temporary workers; and (v) the services are performed for a small business or minority-owned business that is a temporary staffing agency that hires individuals who either have been released from incarceration within the preceding year or are unskilled workers.
Patron - McClellan

F HB1223

Virginia Employment Commission; regional offices. Requires the Virginia Employment Commission to maintain at least one regional office in each planning district in Virginia.
Patron - Bowling

F HB1314

Virginia Employment Commission. Transfers responsibility for collection of employment taxes from the Virginia Employment Commission to the Department of Taxation.
Patron - Byron

F HB1349

Unemployment compensation; trailing spouse of clergy. Provides that good cause for leaving employment exists if an employee voluntarily leaves a job to accompany the employee's spouse to a new location from which the employee's place of employment is not reasonably accessible, when (i) the spouse is a minister, priest, rabbi, or accredited practitioner of any religious organization or denomination usually referred to as a church and (ii) the church has involuntarily reassigned the spouse to serve a congregation in such new location. Benefits paid to qualifying claimants shall be charged against the pool rather than against the claimant's employer.
Patron - Barlow

F SB339

Unemployment compensation; not speaking English is misconduct. Provides that an employee's inability or refusal to speak English at the workplace, in violation of a known policy of the employer, constitutes misconduct. An individual who is found by the Virginia Employment Commission (VEC) to have been discharged for misconduct connected with his work is disqualified from receiving unemployment compensation benefits. The VEC may consider evidence of mitigating circumstances in determining whether misconduct occurred.
Patron - Cuccinelli

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