Winter job market here best in six years

The Flathead Valley winter job market is getting better. Although unemployment saw an uptick to 7.3 percent in November, it was 9.0 percent the previous year, Job Service supervisor Laura Gardner notes.

“We’re doing better this winter than we have in the past six years,” Gardner said last week. “The economy is a whole lot better than it has been.”

The Job Service currently lists about 280 job openings in the area. Some are skilled positions, others are in retail or government jobs.

People looking for seasonal work at places like Glacier National Park or with the Forest Service should be looking right now. The Park Service is advertising for some posts, and the Forest Service is advertising for firefighting and other positions through www.usajobs.gov.

A host of service industry jobs are available in restaurants, hotels and the like. There are even some construction jobs, but not as many as during the building boom of the early and mid 2000s. The medical field is also stable.

Gardner noted the uptick in unemployment here wasn’t unexpected — many people in the Flathead have seasonal jobs.

Montana’s unemployment rate statewide in November was 5.2 percent.