County’s Jobless Rate Up Slightly Last Month

Ventura County’s jobless rate crept up to 4.4% in June as farmers trimmed their payrolls, teachers took summer vacation and fewer workers were needed to wrap up local census efforts.

“As far as unemployment, you can’t get much lower than that,” said Mark Schniepp, director of the Center for Regional Economic Research in Santa Barbara.

But sluggish job growth over the past several months is a sign the county’s red-hot economy is starting to cool off, Schniepp said.

In the first half of this year, 5,600 nonfarm jobs were added in Ventura County, compared with 9,700 during the same period last year.

“Wealth is not being made . . . like it was in 1999,” Schniepp said. “But it’s about time. It’s nothing serious, and actually quite expected.”

Statistics released Friday by the state’s Employment Development Department showed that joblessness inched up 0.8%, from 3.6% in May--a loss of about 1,400 jobs.

But the rate is identical to that of June 1999, said Dee Johnson, a department analyst.

“June always runs a little higher, because we are so affected by agriculture,” she said. “We’re still doing really well in terms of comparisons to the state, and rankings with other counties.”

About 387,600 Ventura County residents were employed last month--down from 390,700 in May, according to the report. About 18,000 people were unemployed.

While the farming and federal government sectors incurred big job losses, local government and the manufacturing industry posted employment growth in June.

Other gains were seen in the transportation and public utilities industries, which added 100 jobs over May. Finance, insurance and real estate were unchanged.

Comparing this year with 1999, the education sector added 1,100 jobs, employing 21,700 people in June of this year compared with 20,600 last June.

The service sector had the most growth during the same period, adding 2,800 jobs, the bulk of them in business services.

The county’s jobless rate was the 18th lowest among the state’s 58 counties, slipping from 15th in May. Unemployment statewide jumped from 4.7% in May to 5.2% in June.

Schniepp said he sees Ventura County starting to turn the corner from the “wild frenzy” economy of 1999 to a more moderate 2000, though he said there is no cause for alarm.

“It’s probably a welcomed feature of the economy, because it has been growing so fast recently,” he said. “It allows things to catch up with themselves.”

Jack Kyser, chief economist for the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corp., said he isn’t concerned that Southern California’s economic downshift will spiral toward recession.

“The key thing is that nonfarm employment growth continues to chug right along,” Kyser said.

Also key for Ventura County, Kyser said, is the addition of about 400 jobs in manufacturing, an industry that has suffered job losses elsewhere in the state.

“That’s critical because these are the middle-class jobs that everyone [worries are] disappearing,” he said.