HONOLULU — The Hawaii Department of Human Resources Development will soon redeploy idle state employees from various departments to help process a massive backlog of unemployment claims, officials said.
Employees who cannot perform their own jobs because of coronavirus safety measures will be reassigned to the Department of Labor & Industrial Relations, The Honolulu Star-Advertiser reported Thursday.
The first of about 90 employees from a pool of 706 idled state workers are expected to be redeployed Friday or Monday.
The state has received 201,836 unemployment claims since the beginning of March through Tuesday, when 6,903 claims were filed.
Department of Human Resources Development Director Ryker Wada detailed the expected reassignments Wednesday to members of the Special Senate Committee on COVID-19.
For most people, the coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough that clear up in two to three weeks. For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia and death.
Wada could not say how many of the 706 employees on the list would be redeployed.
“It’s all dependent on the requests and the need of the departments,” he said.
Wada has yet to receive information about the number of emergency workers needed from several state agencies including the departments of health, defense, agriculture, land and natural resources, and business, economic development and tourism, he said.
The available workers are from executive branch departments overseen by the human resources department, which does not include the education department, University of Hawaii and the Hawaii Health Systems Corp.
There are about 73,000 state employees across the executive, judiciary and legislative branches, according to state data.
The uncertain reassignment timetable drew critical comments from committee members.
“These are the kinds of things that we need to get (workers) doing, and they can do it from home,” Democratic Sen. Donna Mercado Kim said. “We have them sitting there already not doing anything.”