COVID-19

DONATE

As we mentioned, we were very fortunate to have Jackie Turner sit down with us to answer many of your unemployment claim questions.
During our 30-minute interview of her, we were able to answer a majority of the major questions sent to us.
This interview is on our Facebook page today so we invite you to watch it. Hopefully, it will answer your most pressing questions.
Because of time limits, we were not able to answer most of the questions that deal with individual unique situations. Therefore, we will follow up with her about your individual situations and try to get each of you an answer.

I talked with Stacey Pickering today about the status of our veteran nursing homes in light of the coronavirus crisis.
The good news is that there are no coronavirus cases in our veteran nursing homes at this time. Those who work in these homes are to be commended for being vigilant in protecting our veterans.
You should know, however, that part of the protocol that has been very successful in keeping the coronavirus out has been to allow NO VISITORS until the crisis passes. As we have discussed, it could be many weeks before this crisis passes, so until then, you and your constituents need to know that there will be no visitors allowed in our veteran nursing homes.
The only exception for visitors is when it is clear that an end-of-life situation exists.
They ask that everyone be respectful of this protocol because it reflects respect for the health
and well-being of our veterans.

The Families First Coronavirus Response Act requires employers to provide eligible employees certain paid leave:
You can get two weeks of paid leave if you as the employee are quarantined or experiencing coronavirus symptoms or you’re seeking a diagnosis.
You can get two weeks of paid leave at 2/3 pay if your child’s school is closed because of coronavirus or if you’re caring for someone who is quarantined due to coronavirus.
If you’ve been at your current job more than 30 days, you can get ten (10) weeks of paid leave at 2/3 pay to care for your child who is out of school due to coronavirus.
These requirements apply to private employers with fewer than 500 employees and to most state agencies.
Private employees with fewer than 50 employees do NOT have to provide paid leave if doing so would put them out of business.
Employees providing health care and first responders do NOT get leave from work under this law because they are needed to stay in the fight against the virus. They are the heroes of this effort.
We will provide more details on our Facebook page

It is hard to project where the economy is headed, because we really don’t know how long this crisis will last.
Nevertheless, we continue to try to gather data to help us as we make budget decisions, and I know each of you wants to know as much as possible as you make budget decision within your own homes and businesses.
We have been provided the following data which we hope will be helpful to you:
- Experts project a 5.4% decline in US GDP this calendar year.
- Nationally the unemployment rate is expected to peak at 10.3% in the 4th quarter.
- The experts expect the recovery to be strong, but we won’t get back to where we were until mid-2021.
- We don’t expect to get back to the same levels of employment until 2022.
- Our state economist is analyzing this information to assess how Mississippi will be affected. The legislature will account for that assessment when we budget for the coming fiscal year.

We have had phone calls to our office forwarded to our staff. If you need any help at all, please call us at 601-359-3300.
We have also set up an email address for you to ask questions or seek help. That address
is [email protected]v.

share!