SARASOTA – Governor Ron DeSantis continues to boast the success of Florida’s Unemployment System, claiming the state has paid out more than $2.6 billion in unemployment benefits since March 15th.
“So we’ve now paid out $2.8 billion in the last 10 weeks, so that’s more than the state of Florida paid out in the previous five years combined,” said DeSantis.
A Thursday tweet from the governor claims nearly 98% of eligible applicants have been paid. He gets to that number as follows:
- Two million total claims
- Nearly 400 thousand not eligible
- One point six million good claims
- Just under 200 thousand in process
So, that almost 1.5 million processed. And almost a half million ineligible and let’s face it, out in the cold for almost two months.
State Representative Margaret Good disputes the governors numbers. “Unemployment tripled in April to almost 13%,” said Good. “And here we are coming up on June rent is due, bills are due and there are still thousands of Floridians that are waiting for unemployment checks, and the system does not seem to be getting any better.”
Sarasota resident Cindy Lee says she submitted her forms back in early April and is at risk of losing her home if she doesn’t start seeing state money coming in.
“Even if you try to call it was this long wait at the very beginning, it was a long, long, long, long wait and after about an hour they would just cut you off,” said Lee.
Mitchell Macphail and Tyler Harker say they’ve faced challenges similar to Lee’s, claiming it’s nearly impossible to get through to anyone when they call. When they do they’re transferred from one representative to another who don’t have any information or know how to help.
“It’s been very frustrating trying to get not just a hold of anybody but our questions answered if it was his fault for putting in the information incorrectly,” said Macphail. “It would be nice to have some guidance on how to correct that.”
Lee says she has been waiting since April to collect her benefits. Harker and Macphail says they’ve been waiting since March. All three are only asking the governor to take into consideration the 3% of residents who is letting down by putting the blame on them.
If you’re having issues collecting unemployment, we want to hear from you. Message us on Facebook or send us an email at news@snntv.com