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WEDNESDAY, JUNE 29, 2022
River Ridge competes at State FFA Convention
tion portion of the convention, the River Ridge Chapter was proud to have two State FFA Degree Recipients this year. Juniors Cora Dittmar and Nick Schnitzler earned this high-achieving degree and were formally inducted into the State Degree ranks during a convention session. Cora’s record book is on working at her family’s pumpkin patch and orchard, Dittmar Farms, while Nick’s record book was about working on his family’s beef and hay operation. While not in session, students had the opportunity to tour the Capitol Building, Lincoln’s Tomb, and LinSUBMITTED PHOTO Rock Valley Publishing coln’s home. It was a great River Ridge FFA had several members travel to Springfield, IL to compete at the state level. Chapter attendees week to celebrate the stu- included Laiken Haas, Heaven Brotherton, Gracie Vanderheyden, Katie Cobine, Izzy Haring, Cora Dittmar, David dents’ achievements. Buck, Ty Spahn, Lucas Holland, Ashley Carroll, Avery Engle and George Winter.
State audit finds billions in unemployment fraud Agency blames lack of controls on Trump administration
By Beth Hundsdorfer CAPITOL NEWS ILLINOIS
A recently released state audit found nearly $2 billion in federal money intended to help unemployed Illinoisans during the pandemic was lost to fraudulent claims in Illinois. The Illinois Department of Employment Security blamed “insufficient and flawed federal guidance” and a lack of controls on a hastily constructed program put together by the Trump administration. The federally funded Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program provided up to 39 weeks of benefits for unemployed individuals who ran out of regular unemployment benefits and for self-employed individuals, gig workers and others not eligible for regular unemployment. The report released Thursday by Auditor General Frank
Mautino covered much of the life of the program, July 2020 through June 2021. In the early days of the pandemic, amid business shutdowns and high unemployment, states struggled under a crush of claims from those laid off during those shutdowns. Amid this volume of claims, IDES was forced to try to weed out the fraudulent claims while under pressure to get money into the hands of the recently unemployed. The Pritzker administration has said the PUA program was designed hastily and does not give employers an opportunity to challenge fraudulent claims because the type of workers applying for benefits do not technically have employers. The PUA program also eliminated existing controls, including income and employment verification, according to a statement by IDES.
Much of the fraud, up to $163 billion estimated nationwide, involved identity theft. Scammers filed unemployment claims using false identities and then had the payment method switched from the debit cards that people receive when they qualify for benefits to direct deposit into an account accessible by them. The audit found that, of the $3.6 billion in PUA paid out from July 2020 through June 2021, nearly $1.9 billion was found to be fraudulent, mostly due to identity theft. “Overpayments associated with identity theft and traditional fraud within the PUA
program was unprecedented and resulted in fraudsters using highly sophisticated techniques to take advantage of the current economic condition created by the COVID-19 pandemic,” the audit stated. The audit found IDES: • Failed to implement general information technology controls over the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance. • Failed to maintain accurate and complete pandemic unemployment assistance claimant data. • Failed to perform timely cash reconciliations. IDES responded that the system used to manage the
PUA program is independent of the system used to manage regular unemployment benefits. From the beginning of the pandemic in March 2020 through the end of 2021, IDES stopped $40 billion in fraudulent payments from both state and federal programs, according to the agency’s statement. Republicans are calling for hearings related to IDES’ handling of the programs and, specifically, whether the agency failed to follow federal recommendations for fraud prevention tools made available before the pandemic.
See FRAUD, Page 7
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Thirteen members of the River Ridge FFA Chapter attended this year’s State Convention held in Springfield, Illinois June 14 through 16 at the Bank of Springfield Center. Over 4,000 FFA members from across the state gathered to celebrate the year’s success and honor the highest achieving members. The theme for this year’s convention was “initiate.” River Ridge members participated in several areas at the state competition. Ashley Carroll, a member of the graduating class of 2022, competed in the Job Interview Leadership Development Event where the top 20 students from across the state qualified to go through a mock-interview process. Although she did not place in the top three, she represented the chapter well and her experience and job-interview skills will serve her in the future. The Greenhand (first year FFA member) quiz bowl team earned their way into the state competition bracket by winning in the section last fall. Team members Katie Cobine, Ty Spahn, Gracie Vanderheyden, David Buck and Laiken Haas did a great job by sweeping the first round but fell in the second with a score of four to eight in this single-elimination bracket. Arthur Horn compiled a record of the 21-22 school year FFA activities in a FFA scrapbook and entered his efforts in the state competition as well. With the help of Heaven Brotherton (22-23 Chapter Reporter), Cora Dittmar (2223 Chapter President and Avery Engle (22-23 Chapter VP) in the interview portion of the event the scrapbook earned a “Gold” level rating, the highest possible. In addition to the competi-