By ADAM SICHKO
Albany Business Review
Gov. David Paterson has signed a bill that extends unemployment benefits to tens of thousands of New Yorkers an extra 13 weeks.
Legislative leaders sped the bill through the state Senate and Assembly because 56,000 New Yorkers were scheduled to go off unemployment at the end of this week. Now, unemployment benefits for those people, and 64,000 others, will continue uninterrupted.
Paterson said the extended benefits will not increase the amount of unemployment-insurance tax assessed on employers. The legislation enables the state to use $645 million of federal stimulus money to pay for the extended benefits.
"Unemployment benefits are automatic stimulus, along with food stamps. People who are out of work still need to spend money," Paterson said.
The statewide unemployment rate was 8.1 percent in March; it is above 9 percent in the Buffalo area.
The state's unemployment fund went broke at the start of this year, and the state expects to borrow $1.4 billion this year to pay out unemployment benefits. At least 430,000 people are receiving unemployment benefits from the state right now.
The extra benefits will cost the state and its counties $28 million in administrative and other costs, Paterson said. That will be paid for using revenue from an increase in personal income taxes that's included in the state budget.
New York unemployment benefits last for 26 weeks. The maximum weekly benefit is $405.
The state AFL-CIO called on state leaders to raise the maximum benefit and index it to inflation, so that it would increase every year. Several bills have been introduced in the Legislature to do just that, and pay for the increases by raising taxes on employers.
"Unfortunately, Gov. Paterson and the state Legislature have yet to build on (President Obama's) initiative by enacting necessary reforms at the state level. This includes increasing the state's embarrassingly low maximum benefit, indexing that benefit and restoring our chronically underfunded unemployment trust fund to solvency," said union president Denis Hughes.
Paterson and other state leaders could not say what will happen at the end of the 13-week period.
"Like with everything else, there's a point that we're not able to help anymore. We'll work right up until when that day comes to try to get New Yorkers back to work and sustain them when they're out of work," Paterson said.
The law clarifies the state's unemployment law to make sure it complies with federal stimulus provisions. The law now says that people can receive unemployment benefits if they leave work because of:

• Domestic violence.
• Tending to sick family members.
• Following a spouse who must move to a new region to become employed.

Supporters said those reasons had been affirmed before in court cases.