The Colorado Department of Labor and Employment today said its Unemployment Insurance program is being reorganized to concentrate on customer service, a move that will reduce its workforce by as many as 50 jobs.
Ellen Golombek, the department’s executive director, said that while some positions will be eliminated, the reorganization will increase the number of staff adjudicating unemployment claims from 108 to more than 140 and will increase the number of staff answering phones from about 34 to more than 50.
“The goal is to focus on customer service,” said Golombek.
She said the reorganization has been guided by economic realities and a need to improve performance in the unemployment insurance program.
The Unemployment Insurance division employs roughly 600 people. It’s post-reorganization headcount won’t be known until October because of attrition and bumping rights, Golombek said.
But she estimated the jobs of between 20 and 50 individuals will be eliminated with attrition impacting the final number.
“I want to be clear, it’s not direct apples-to-apples,” she said. “We are eliminating some positions and creating new positions.”
Since October 2010, 78 people employed by the unemployment program have left including those who retired or found other jobs, she said.
The unemployment insurance program’s workload has experienced significant increases. In July 2008, prior to the recession in Colorado, there were 30,000 people on unemployment insurance. A year later, that grew to 135,000 and has remained at “unprecedented levels,” according to the department.
In July, the figure was 102,000.
Officials said the state received one-time federal funding during the recession to increase staff but the money has run out and the 600 employee-level isn’t sustainable.
As far as the reorganization, Golombek said by increasing staff adjudicating claims, the claims can be resolved more quickly and accurately.
By increasing staff answering the phones, the number of calls answered each week will jump 25 percent to more than 2,000.
Part of the reorganization is a changed management structure and manager-to-staff ratios. Golombek said consolidation of several program support functions allowed the number of branches to be reduced from 8 to 4, requiring fewer senior managers.
She also said the size of the work teams across the organization was increased, reducing the number of mid-level supervisors needed. Each supervisors will now work with about 17 employees instead of 9.
In addition, the reorganization calls for “strategic use” of permanent part-time positions – 25 percent of all positions will be classified as permanent-part time. Also, Golombek said support functions are being moved into either Claimant Services or Employer Services.
Howard Pankratz: 303-954-1939 or hpankratz@denverpost.com.
