The big story this Thursday night
at 6:30 and Arizona State Agency
facing its biggest demand in history,
continues to have issues serving
Arizonans for 2 1/2 years.
12 news exposed problems at Arizona
Department of Economic Security,
problems that prevented an unknown number of
Arizonans from getting the help they need.
Good evening, I'm tram.
I'm Jonathan McCall. Team 12.
Colleen Sakura got a chance to talk
with Arizonans still struggling as
the agency's director has remained
unwilling to answer questions.
It's a story of two realities.
People who lost their jobs and
are trying to get help up against
those who stole benefits through
fraud and an agency that couldn't
always tell the difference.
It's an agency meant to help people.
They are trying to get out of me
that as of late just kind of been a
slap in the face, really is asking
Arizonans for some of that help back.
And I got the statement of account saying
that I owe them $14,000.
Yeah, I was freaking out a little
bit. The Arizona Department of.
Economic security?
In charge of distributing billions in
pandemic unemployment benefits. Our
list of whether they were eligible or not.
Too many people are getting these
bills saying you have to pay us
that unemployment insurance back,
and the worst of it is.
We could see it coming when it
was happening two years ago,
two years ago
we have seen the demand just surged.
This is what happens when 10s of
thousands of people who work in a new
economy all need a life preserver at
one time from an agency that's not quite
ready to handle them this ancient.
Computer system they're
working with that has never been
tested for a disaster relief.
What started as an overwhelmed
and outdated computer
system. We had to procure a new system
and we did that with record speed,
led to glitch. Waited all day until
6:00 o'clock with anticipation by
11:00 o'clock I just went to bed
after Glitch. I haven't
received a penny. And what DES
says is billions paid out in
fraud as Arizonans waited.
I just couldn't understand how
you can close a card without
investigating a fraud first
the last time and only time.
DHS director Michael Wisehart spoke
with 12 news in July of 2020.
They see it as system glitches and
that's really unfortunate that we're
not able to seamlessly pay all of the
law abiding individuals while also
identifying all of the fraudulent claim.
That's the problem that persisted
into the spring of 2021.
The people on these threads that are
like, what do I do, what do I do?
While billions went to fraudsters,
real Arizonans who qualified
for help couldn't get it.
Come summer 2021,
the US Department of Labor found
Arizona did worse than 40 states on
how quickly it passed out benefits.
DHS director Wisehart still not
answering questions about the issues.
Any tax funded agency
needs to be transparent.
Because it is our
dollars they've spent.
By November 2021, the Arizona
Auditor General found ES paid out
more than $4 billion in fraudulent
claims because it didn't put all
critical anti fraud measures in
place when it was required to.
Hundreds of fraud cases have
resulted in criminal charges.
DES says it has worked to
recover more than a billion
in fraudulent money paid. It
was just an example of just
bad operation by DES,
the Arizona Ombudsman recommending in
a report this year the legislature.
Consider auditing DES. It's
something temporary that's starting
to alleviate because it was
a once in a lifetime crisis.
But more problems are hurting Real Arizonans.
DES also overpaid more than $121
million in benefits to Arizonans and is
trying to get some of that money back.
That the fault of myself or anybody
else that qualified for the program?
No, that is the director of DES Fall.
Still 12 news, not allowed to speak with
director Wisehart about that and Arizonans.
There's no question I'm going
to rule in your favor here,
left in some cases with the
only option to try and appeal.
What is the point in trying to take their
money from me when I wasn't making any
money and I barely make any money now?
The Arizona Auditor General also
finding another 108,000 Arizonans might
have been overpaid by the department,
but DES doesn't know because they're
still looking back at claims even
though the federal unemployment
payments ended more than a year ago,
leaving Arizonans wondering if.
The help they
got was actual help.
The agency is a disaster.
We we've known that for since
the program started or headache.
I think responsible is the
director because he's the one
who's overseeing everything and
he's the one who asked to pretty
much come down and answer for it.
So where is the director of DES?
We don't know. We know that his
salary is more than $200,000 a year.
We've requested his calendar,
as well as his badge swipes in and
out of state buildings, but those have
yet to be provided by the department.
And our multiple and repeated interview
requests continue to be ignored.
We'll keep asking.
Colleen Secora, 12 news.