By Jon King / jking@whmi.com


A local lawmaker is among those calling for the departure of Unemployment Insurance Agency Director Liza Estlund Olson.

Republican State Rep. Ann Bollin of Brighton Township on Thursday joined House Speaker Jason Wentworth in calling for the removal Estlund Olson, who was appointed as director 10 months ago by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. In a press release, Bollin noted that the previous leader resigned amid criticism and failure and things “have not gotten any better at the UIA under Estlund Olson’s direction.”

Bollin said it’s time for the governor to give the troubled agency new leadership and a new direction. “The unemployment agency is riddled with problems that have gone on for months with no resolution. This agency has repeatedly let the people of Michigan down, and there has been no accountability. It’s time for the governor to fix this and find a new director who can help the people who have been struggling with the agency for far too long.”

Bollin adds that Michigan’s unemployment agency has been a “constant source of problems for residents during the COVID pandemic,” noting that in 2020, “the agency paid out millions in fraudulent claims, delayed payments for months to tens of thousands of real Michigan residents, and allowed politically connected state employees to skip the line past hard-working families trying to make ends meet.”

She says recent instances of mismanagement include unresolved issues noted in a failed a federal monitoring report last winter and confusion over the potential that 700,000 people may have been ineligible to receive benefits already paid to them.

“Enough is enough,” Bollin said. “When is the governor going to hold her appointee accountable? It was troubling enough when the economic shutdown put so many people out of work and forced them to turn to unemployment. It’s even more unacceptable that so many of our friends and neighbors are still dealing with this agency’s failures months later.”

In response, Whitmer spokesperson Bobby Leddy told MLive that it was “unfortunate that the legislature is focused on lobbying partisan political attacks” instead of working with the administration on fixes to the system. Leddy also said that to date, “99% of eligible Michiganders who applied for unemployment benefits have been approved,” and that the state is working overtime to “get the final 1% across the finish line”.