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Legislation that would revise the laws and regulations governing New Jersey's unemployment insurance fund in an attempt to make it more stable has been introduced by Sen. Joe Pennacchio (R-Morris).

"Today the state of New Jersey has borrowed more than $1.2 billion to keep our Unemployment Insurance fund solvent," Pennacchio said Wednesday.

"The state is in this predicament because over the past eight years levies paid by employees and employers to support the fund have been consistently diverted to pay the state's general operating expenses. I fought these diversions at the time but now the unemployment insurance fund has become dangerously depleted and corrective measures must be taken."

Pennacchio's bill (S-1854) echos changes supported by Gov. Chris Christie. It calls for a reduction of the maximum weekly benefit by $50 to $550 per week, while tying future benefit increases to fund solvency; imposes a one-week waiting period on a new claimant, and restricts the benefit payment for a claimant who has been dismissed for misconduct. Additionally, the bill would establish a shared work unemployment benefits program.

"This common-sense reform legislation is designed to ensure that the unemployment insurance fund is never used by Trenton politicians as a personal piggy bank," Pennacchio said. "Middle-class working families' pay into the fund fully expecting that if they lose their job the funds they have paid into the fund will be available."

– TOM HESTER SR., NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM