More than 11,000 people in a six-county region ? which includes Cowley County ? have been laid off from their job some time within the last year, according to a report released Monday.
That number grew only slightly from May when the Work Force Alliance of South Central Kansas reported that 10,848 had been affected by layoffs. The numbers include anyone laid off in Cowley, Sumner, Sedgwick, Butler, Harper, or Kingman counties since July 2008.
Of the total layoffs, 9,005 were reported from the aviation manufacturing industry, 1,349 from non-aviation manufacturing and 655 from the services industry.
Unemployment in Cowley County dropped from 6.6 percent in March to 6.1 percent in April. In July 2008, the county unemployment rate was 4.7 percent.
The state unemployment rate is also at 6.1 percent while the national rate is 8.6.
There were 26,007 initial claims for unemployment benefits in Kansas during April 2009, up from 23,798 initial claims last month and up from 10,601 in April 2008.
