One Thousand New Unemployed East Bay Residents in June

The East Bay economy is pretty well in sync with these languid summer days, employment data released on Friday shows.

The unemployment rate in the Oakland-Fremont-Hayward metropolitan area was 10.9 percent in June, up slightly from 10.2 in May, according to figures from the state Employment Development Department.

Compared to a year ago, there were nearly 5,000 fewer jobs available in the East Bay last month.

The number of unemployed Alameda County residents increased by 5,500 from May to June to reach a total of 80,900 out-of-work individuals as of last month, according to the data.

Joseph Barr of San Leandro has been out of work for six months after the gas station he was commuting to in Redwood City struggled to stay afloat.

So at 57, the former smog certification technician is embarking on a career change.

He enrolled in a green energy program at Laney College in Oakland, earning his Building Performance Institute certification. The institute is an independent organization that sets standards for residential energy efficiency retrofitting.

Baur said he hopes to find a green energy job that will keep him in the Bay Area.

Overall, California added nearly 30,000 jobs last month, beating the national job growth figure. On balance, the U.S. added just 18,000 jobs in June. 

The national unemployment rate stands at a stagnant 9.2 percent. 

As the recession drags on, employers are finding ways to increase productivity with fewer employees, said Scott Peterson, deputy director of the public-private East Bay Economic Development Alliance. 

“When you increase productivity, that’s a good thing, but only in the measure of getting more done and spending less money,” Peterson said. 

“Unfortunately, it doesn’t mean there’s much more job creation.” 

Peterson said he’s hopeful companies will start hiring again when the economy picks up, “but the difficulty is no one is really sure when that’s going to be,” he said.

Some economic sectors did better than others in June. 

Most of the jobs created in the East Bay last month were in the professional and business services sector (2,900 jobs) and the leisure and hospitality sector (2,600 jobs), according to the state data. 

The beleaguered construction industry added 1,800 jobs last month. Most of the jobs gained were specialty trade contractors (1,200 jobs) — double the average number gained in this sub-industry between May and June over the last 21 years, according to Cindy Sugrue from the EDD’s labor market information division in Concord.

Sugrue said this could be thanks to significant highway construction taking place in the East Bay. 

Cuts to public school budgets over the past year have led to thousands of local jobs lost in that sector.

Local and state public schools lost a total of 3,400 jobs over the past year, accounting for nearly 60 percent of the jobs shed from state government payrolls since June 2010, according to the data.

At the same time, private educational and health services gained 3,500 jobs over the past year.

Patch reporter Laith Agha contributed to this report.