Some Nevada gig workers will have to wait another week for pay

Some Nevada workers waiting weeks or months for their pending unemployment benefits will have to sit tight for one more week.

But the funds are coming. Payments will begin Tuesday.

A Nevada judge signed an order Wednesday mandating that the Department of Employment, Training and Rehabilitation resume paying gig, self-employed and independent workers who previously received money under their benefits program, Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, before the state froze their funds.

Judge Barry Breslow’s order provided four exceptions for the resumption of payments: failure to file a weekly claim, making too much money to qualify for benefits, “clear and convincing evidence” of fraud or until a worker can make his or her case.

Additionally, Breslow, of the Second Judicial District Court, ordered the state’s employment agency to consider eligible for PUA benefits those gig workers who still worked some hours or whose business or ability to do their job is affected by the COVID-19 pandemic and statewide shutdown. DETR previously deemed ineligible any claimant who was working.

Breslow signaled his intent to sign such an order in a Monday court hearing for a lawsuit filed in May on behalf of gig workers against DETR. Breslow denied other requests of the lawsuit, which sought immediate payment of all pending PUA claims.

At the Monday hearing, Breslow set a July 30 follow-up hearing to see whether DETR has made progress in addressing:

— A backlog of claimants caught “in no man’s land” who are unsure whether they’re eligible for PUA and traditional unemployment benefits.

— Prioritization for first-week filers.

— Why some people claimed PUA benefits in late February and early March, before the COVID-19 shutdown in Nevada began.

DETR received 325,732 new PUA claims between May 16 (when PUA claims began to be accepted in Nevada) and Friday. Of those, 87 percent had been filed weekly as of July 13, according to department statistics. DETR has paid more than 114,000 PUA claims as of July 16.

The ruling does not apply to Nevadans claiming traditional unemployment benefits.

Contact Mike Shoro at mshoro@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-5290. Follow @mike_shoro on Twitter.