DOVER, Del. (AP) - The number of initial unemployment claims filed by Delawareans ticked up slightly last week even as businesses begin to prepare for a gradual reopening of the state’s economy amid the coronavirus epidemic.
The Delaware Department of Labor reported Thursday that just under 5,600 initial unemployment claims were filed for the week ending May 16. That’s up from about 5,200 the previous week and the first increase in seven weeks.
Officials said almost 96,000 jobless claims have been filed since March 15, and more than $234.7 million in unemployment benefits paid. That total includes $142 million in federal funds and almost $92 million from Delaware’s unemployment insurance trust fund.
Darryl Scott, director of the Division of Unemployment Insurance, told a state panel Thursday that the fund paid out a total of $59 million in 2019, compared to more than $91 million in just the past two months.
“The trust fund is about $100 million,” Scott told the Delaware Economic and Financial Advisory Council. “We expect that that fund will go to zero sometime in late June.”
Scott said officials anticipate having to borrow hundreds of millions of dollars from the federal government between now and the end of the year in order to keep the fund solvent.
“There may be additional need for borrowing into next year as well,” Scott said.
Scott said the federal coronavirus response package includes a provision allowing states to borrow from the federal government at zero interest for the rest of the year, but that future loans would be subject to interest.
State budget director Mike Jackson noted that in addition to the loan option, the Treasury Department has said states can use some of the money they receive under the federal Coronavirus Relief Fund to help cover state-funded unemployment claims.
Amid economic restrictions imposed by Democratic Gov. John Carney in an effort to stem the spread of the virus, the number of jobless claims approached 19,000 for the last week of March and the first week of April. The previous monthly record for unemployment claim filings in Delaware over the past three decades was a little more than 9,600 in January 2002.
Carney has already loosened some of restrictions on economic activity under pressure from the business, tourism and agricultural communities but has kept others in place, including a ban on hotel room and beach home rentals. The official first phase of a gradual reopening of the state’s economy is to begin June 1.
Meanwhile, a ban on sunbathing and swimming at Delaware beaches will be lifted at 5 p.m. Friday.
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