Benefits: eligibility determination: inmates.

Existing law authorizes the Employment Development Department (department) to administer the federal-state unemployment insurance program and provides for the payment of unemployment compensation benefits to eligible individuals who are unemployed through no fault of their own. Existing law establishes procedures for the filing, determination, and payment of benefit claims, and those benefits are payable from the Unemployment Fund. Existing law requires the department to promptly pay benefits if it finds the claimant is eligible and to promptly deny benefits if it finds the claimant is ineligible for benefits. Existing law requires the department to consider facts submitted by an employer in making this determination and also provides for the department to audit claims, as specified. This bill would, beginning July 1, 2021, require the department, as part of its process for determining eligibility for unemployment insurance benefits, cross-check all claimant information with state and county correctional facility inmate data in an effort to detect fraudulent applications. This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as an urgency statute.