Looking at the numbers can be disheartening.

Union County’s unemployment rate jumped to 21.7 percent in December, up half a percentage point from November. That ranks the county at No. 4 in the state for the percentage of population known to be unemployed.

The state’s unemployment rate climbed to 12.6 percent in December.

The challenges the county, state and country face when it comes to the job market are real but while the rising unemployment rate seems to portray an economic landscape without any available avenues for work, Union Workforce Center Job Developer Melody Brutkiewicz pointed out there are businesses and industries looking for employees in and around the area.

“We’ve never had a client come in we could not find something to refer them to,” she said.

The Workforce Center on the Duncan Bypass in Union has seen more than 5,000 people since the beginning of the year come through its doors to file or claim for unemployment benefits or search for jobs. And while one of the purposes for the center and South Carolina Employment Security Commission is to make sure unemployment benefits are paid, Brutkiewicz said there’s more to their function than that.

“People think of us as the unemployment office,” she said. “But we are the workforce center. We have to administer the unemployment benefits to the best of our abilities but our ultimate goal is to get people back to work.”

Performing a job search at the SCESC’s Web site — www.scjoblink.com — Brutkiewicz found 105 jobs just being listed by the government agency within a 25 mile radius of Union on Tuesday. Going up to a 50 mile radius offered 577 available jobs the agency is listing.

Those jobs are everything from entry level positions to highly-skilled occupations — anything from health care to manufacturing.

There are listings for security officers, corrections officers, LPNs, medical records people, a mail manager, servers, drivers, millwrights, shift managers, office managers and a host of other open and currently available jobs.

There’s even a listing looking specifically for people 55 years old and older to be a part of a senior citizens training program for clerical, switchboard, food service and other occupations.

And those are the jobs just listed by the SCESC. By performing an advanced search — which opens the job seeker to other listings from places and Web sites like Monster.com — the number of job listings within a 25-mile radius of Union increases to 1,141.

Applying for any of those jobs, quite often, is simply a click away. People can do it on their own by logging onto JobLink or visiting the workforce center for assistance from Brutkiewicz or any of the center’s other job developers.

The workforce center has the tools people need to get back to work.

“We’ve got some great tools to get you there,” Brutkiewicz said.

She said most people in Union County are driving 25-30 minutes one way to work if they aren’t working here, according to the last census in 2000. The Union office has had much success over the years in placing people in positions related to the transportation industry — CDL drivers, dump truck drivers, forklift operators, etc. — but where the most money is now is in electromechanical work.

Gestamp is one local industry seeking these types of skilled tradesmen and Brutkiewicz said there are even more of these industries in and around the Spartanburg area and new firms opening in the Duncan area — close enough that people in Union County with the right skills would qualify.

An electromechanical technician is someone with knowledge of both electrical and mechanical fields plus robotics.

“In today’s manufacturing environment, you need to know how to do all of that,” Brutkiewicz said. “Someone who has all that knowledge — those are the people demanding the highest wages.”

She added as more and more plants and industries are upgraded, more and more emphasis is being placed on the robotics side of the equation. Even poultry processing plants are seeking people who know how to fix and operate new production lines.

Electromechanical technician positions — in this area — fetch a starting wage of $18 per hour and, with experience, can pay as much as $25-$30 per hour.

There also are projects being built now or in the works which will bring jobs closer to home for Union County residents.

Brutkiewicz said the new power plant being constructed in Cliffside, NC — only 37 miles away — will need employees when it’s complete and a new nuclear power plant planned for Jenkinsville eventually will need employees as well.

Both of those projects also will employ the people needed to construct each facility, offering an even more diverse range of jobs for the taking.

Brutkiewicz understands the challenges Union County faces, especially with the industry turmoil that has changed the workforce landscape here over the last several years.

“Union County is still suffering from the exodus of the textiles,” she said. “I can’t say how many mills have closed in the last five years, but it’s been a lot.”

Brutkiewicz added there hasn’t been a lot of new business and industry to fill the void the closing of those textile mills left behind and, geographically, Union County is hindered by not being close to the Interstate 26 corridor and while the work ethic is evident in residents many don’t have skills needed to compete in today’s job markets.

It’s a dual challenge for Union County to increase the skills of the workforce and attract employers to this area. But for people who want to work and want to learn the skills needed to obtain available positions, Brutkiewicz said there are opportunities available.

“There are jobs out there,” she said.

SERVICES:

The South Carolina Employment Security Commission offers several services to people looking for work and businesses. Its primary function is to match job seekers with prospective employers. Its Workforce Centers offer:

For Job Seekers

• Electronic job listings

• Testing and career guidance

• Job fairs

• SC JobLink Web-based system

For Businesses

• Worker recruiting, screening and referral

• Mass hiring and recruitment for new and expanding businesses

• Customized business services

Unemployment Services

• A comprehensive system for payment of UI benefits

• Maintenance of a trust fund financed through equitable employer taxes for funding benefit payments

• Assistance with employer-filed claims

• Resolution of disputed UI claims and responses to customer inquiries

• Assistance with submitting required employer reports

Labor Market Information

• Industry employment satistics

• Occupational employment and wages

• Labor force and unemployment

• Mass layoff statistics

• Job outlook

• Equal Employment Opportunity data tool

• Worker commuting patterns

• Other LMI services, including presentations for educational and business settings, employment tracking, area profiles (economic and demographic snapshots) and a wide variety of published materials.

WHAT IS JOBLINK:

JobLink — at www.scjoblink.org — is a no-fee job matching and workplace information service for job seekers and employers in South Carolina. JobLink is a portal to services offered through the South Carolina Employment Security Commission. JobLink assists job seekers and employers in several areas:

• Job listings: The Web site can access the latest job listings employers have submitted daily. Searches can be performed by type of work, county or a variety of other criteria.

• Resume preparation: The site walks you through the entire resume building process and allows it to be viewed by employers online and sends emails as new jobs are added.

• Labor market information: The resource provides up-to-date statistics on job seeker and employer characteristics, workforce supply and demand and salary trends.

• Community relations: It provides connections to numerous South Carolina and national disability and government resources.

Log onto www.scjoblink.org TODAY!

FOR MORE INFO:

For additional information on what the SCESC can do for you or to inquire about available work in the Union County area, contact: Union Workforce Center, 440 Duncan Highway, Union, SC, or call (864) 427-5672. You also can visit www.scjoblink.org to begin your own job search or get more information about available work and business solutions.