Thousands of Jobless in State Face Loss of Benefits : Assistance: Federal program is due to lapse, and state has not voted to provide funds to extend it. Up to 26 extra weeks of help for long-term unemployed are at risk.

Thousands of jobless Californians will begin losing unemployment benefits in October as a federal emergency assistance program lapses and the state takes no action to provide required matching funds, a report by a Washington-based research center predicted Thursday.

The report by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities said California, with the nation’s second-highest unemployment rate, will be one of the states most severely affected by the federal and state decisions that jeopardize benefits for the long-term unemployed.

The federal program enacted in 1991 as the nation was deep in economic recession has provided up to 26 additional weeks of benefits for the thousands of unemployed workers who could still not find jobs after their regular state benefits ended. The report said that in California alone, an average of 270,000 jobless a month were receiving these benefits in the first six months of 1993.

But the report said that the emergency program, financed entirely by federal funds, is scheduled to expire Oct. 2 and that there appears to be little interest in Washington in extending it.

In that event, California is one of 14 states that would be eligible to continue to receive the extended benefits under a backup program, researchers said, but there is a hitch: The state would have to pay half the cost.

In 1992, the Legislature passed a bill authorizing state participation in the extended benefits program but it was vetoed by Gov. Pete Wilson, who said he feared that it would lead to an increase in business taxes. As it turned out, the bill was not needed that year because Congress voted at the last minute to extend the program. This year, with national unemployment on the decline, the report said the mood in Congress is much less favorable for an extension. And in the California Legislature, it noted, there is no bill pending that would authorize state funding for extended benefits.

“It is unprecedented that any large state with such high unemployment has ever refused to enact legislation that would trigger participation in this extended program,” said Iris Lav, one of the authors of the report. The center is a research organization financed primarily by private institutions, including Ford and Rockefeller foundations, that focus on government policies affecting poor- and moderate-income Americans.

Lav estimated that in California about 50,000 unemployed workers a month--state figures 66,000--would be affected by the expiration of the federal program. Those receiving benefits under the emergency program before Oct. 2 would continue to receive them, she said, but anyone whose state unemployment benefits ended after that date would not be eligible for additional assistance. Unemployment benefits range from $40 to $230 a month depending on work history and former earnings level.

J. P. Tremblay, a spokesman for Wilson, said that the governor was still opposed to any legislation authorizing the expenditure of state funds for additional unemployment benefits. He said the money would have to come out of the state’s unemployment fund, which derives its revenues from a tax that California employers pay on each worker’s wages. The cost of the program, he said, would undoubtedly trigger an increase in these taxes at a time when employers are already struggling to make ends meet.

Tremblay said the Wilson Administration does not share the center’s pessimism over the prospects for a congressional extension and believes the issue should be focused on Washington. “California has been hit unequally hard by many of the budget cuts and base closures. Our feeling is the feds have to do their share now to help us out,” he said. “We feel this is far from being a dead issue.”

If Congress does not extend the program, he said the governor may be willing to revisit the issue.

Sen. Patrick Johnston, (D-Stockton), sponsor of the benefits legislation vetoed last year, said: “Extending benefits for the long-term unemployed who are looking for work and can’t find it in this economy is a humane and justified course of action, and I hope the governor will reconsider.”