While unemployment rates are down again in Chautauqua County for April, this is raising concerns about summer hiring.
The New York State Department of Labor reports April’s rate is 3.2% compared with 4.2% in March, and is down from April 2022’s rate of 3.5%.
Cattaraugus County’s unemployment rate was also 3.2% for April compared with 4.3% for March. This is also down from a year ago when the unemployment rate was 3.8% in April 2022.
Chautauqua County Executive PJ Wendel said there are great concerns across the various hiring sectors in the county, “It’s good that our numbers are that low, but, yeah, if you have low unemployment and you’re still looking for 500 to 1,000 jobs for the upcoming tourism season, that’s a big concern. Chautauqua (Institution) talks about it all the time. Michael Hill, you know. And that’s only one small, it’s kind of a microcosm. They’re kind of a concentrated area. They used to have hundreds of college kids who would come in and converge and live in the Institution and work on the Institution grounds. Those numbers are diminished.”
Wendel added he doesn’t have an answer for how to solve hiring issues but encourages all residents who are able to work to apply for summer jobs.
Leave a Reply