August 11th, 2009 by Reed Allmand 
According to an article in the Dallas Morning News, the Texas Workforce Commission has begun paying out as much as 13 weeks of additional unemployment benefits to the state’s chronically unemployed. Last month the commission announced that they couldn’t pay extra unemployment benefits until November because of computer problems and complex federal rules that were difficult to abide by. But to due to outrage expressed by unemployed workers and their advocates, the commission has moved quickly to insure that there would be no delay in receiving unemployment benefits extensions.
The Texas Workforce Commission has struggled to keep pace with the massive influx of unemployed citizens as job losses have continued to rise. In June approximately 527,000 Texans were receiving unemployment benefits, compared to only 146,000 unemployed workers in June 2008. In the Dallas-Fort Worth region alone, more than 134,000 people were drawing benefits in June, more that four times the 33,000 people who were receiving unemployment benefits a year earlier. These figures are set to increase as job losses rise and many companies downsize their workforce in an effort to avoid bankruptcy.
About Reed Allmand
Allmand's vision is rooted in his own financially precarious childhood in Abilene "My father always had difficulty holding a job and supporting our family, so after my parents divorced when I was 12, my sister and I got jobs to help make ends meet," he recalls. "I remember what it felt like as a child to worry that our car would be repossessed or home foreclosed on."
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