About one of every eight Kokomo residents and one of nine in Howard County were unemployed in October — a little-changed statistic in recent months.
But when the city’s largest employer announces billion-dollar investments that will retain at least half its employees long-term, the signs are there that things are gradually getting better, said the county’s head of economic development.
The unemployment rate remained about the same in Kokomo from September to October, improving to 12.6 percent from 12.7 percent the month before, the Indiana Department of Workforce Development reported Tuesday.
The department reported 60 people in Kokomo went back to work during October.
Howard County, which had the ninth highest unemployment rate in Indiana last month, improved slightly more than the city. It’s jobless rate was 10.9 percent in October from 11.3 percent in September.
Jeb Conrad, president and CEO of the Greater Kokomo Economic Development Alliance, said the rates likely would continue to change little by little.
However, with Chrysler Group LLC’s announcement Tuesday that it will invest $843 million in Kokomo, which is on top of $343 million it already was planning, the county should only see improvement, Conrad said. The company expects the most recent investment to retain 2,250 jobs, about half its employees in Kokomo.
“If you look at all the experts,” Conrad said, “they still think that the job recovery portion is still going to happen at a slower rate.”
The state, which saw a 0.2 percent drop in unemployment and a 9.9 percent jobless rate in October, grew 7,600 private-sector jobs during the month, according to Workforce Development.
The largest gain was 4,500 jobs in professional and business services. The largest loss was 1,000 jobs in leisure and hospitality.
Valerie Kroeger, a spokeswoman for Workforce Development, said jobs in Kokomo’s most prominent business sector, manufacturing, experienced little change in employment numbers from September to October.
Manufacturers tend to undergo layoffs close to the holidays, she said, so those numbers could drop in the next few months, then rebound.
At the same time, holiday retail employment has begun. The state’s unemployment report for November, which it will be released in December, should reflect those seasonal hires, Kroeger said.