Jobless Rate Drops for 2nd Month in a Row : Recession: Officials discount the significance of the declines because new unemployment filings jumped nearly 7%.

Ventura County’s unemployment rate fell in November for the second consecutive month, but the county’s economy shows no signs of shaking off the recession, state officials said Monday.

The state Employment Development Department reported that the county’s jobless rate fell to 7.2%, down from 7.6% in October and from a five-year high of 7.8% in September. The rate was 7.5% in November, 1990.

But state officials said the drops might not mean much since new unemployment claims filed in December jumped nearly 7% from November and were 35% above December, 1990.

“Things have not really changed much,” said Annette Sparks, manager of the state unemployment office in south Oxnard. “We’re still going to feel this recession for at least the first half of this year.”

The state’s monthly unemployment breakdown was released on the same day that the U.S. Department of Labor further extended benefits for California workers who have exhausted their 26 weeks of unemployment benefits.

The extended benefits will stretch from 13 to 20 weeks because California registered one of the highest unemployment rates in the nation in November.

The state’s 7.3% rate was marginally lower than the 8% to 9% rates in Massachusetts, Illinois and Michigan. But it was far higher than in Nebraska, South Dakota and Hawaii, which recently have registered below 3%.

Nearly 3,000 long-term unemployed Ventura County residents have applied for the additional benefits since they were first offered Nov. 18.

“We never really got hit here in California with the recession of the early 1980s, so maybe we’re now getting our comeuppance,” said Patricia Baldoni, employment services supervisor at the state unemployment office in Simi Valley. “And we probably won’t see our way out of it until the end of this year.”

About 26,700 Ventura County residents were out of work in November, down from 28,000 in October and 28,100 in November, 1990.

But while the rate dropped, the county lost 1,700 jobs in agriculture, 900 in manufacturing and 500 in food processing--mainly in citrus-packing plants that shut down early because of lingering problems associated with the December, 1990, freeze.

“Typically, the packinghouses shut down in early December, but some were closing as early as September and October,” said Rex Laird, executive director of the Ventura County Farm Bureau.

In contrast with Ventura County’s rate, joblessness ran as high as 20.2% in agricultural Imperial County in November, and as low as 3.3% in Marin and San Mateo counties near San Francisco.

While the county’s November jobless rate was marginally better than the statewide average, it exceeded the 6.6% national unemployment rate. Rates cited are not adjusted for expected seasonal shifts in certain industries such as farming and construction.