Kern unemployment improves to 8.3%
Kern County’s unemployment rate dropped 1.3 percentage points in April on a big jump in seasonal farm hiring, the state Employment Development Department reported Friday.
Last month’s improvement to a seasonally unadjusted 8.3% — still above the year-ago mark of 7% — came despite the addition of 3,100 people to the county’s labor force, the EDD said. It noted the number of county residents on unemployment fell 13% in April to settle at 32,800.
By far the biggest factor behind the change in the bottom line was a 30%, 13,300-worker expansion of Kern’s pool of farmworkers, state data showed. Most other sectors were unchanged from March, or nearly so, suggesting talk of an economic recession remains just that.
One field that saw hiring locally was health care and social services, which together added 900 jobs, or 2 percent, according to the EDD. It said restaurants across the county added 400 jobs, or 1.6%, while local education gained 800 workers, or 2.4%.
State and federal joblessness also improved, both by half a percentage point: The EDD pegged California’s seasonally unadjusted rate in April at 4.3% and the nation’s at 3.1%.
Farmland values mostly held steady in Kern County during the
first quarter of this year, according to a report released Friday by Bakersfield brokerage and appraisal firm Alliance Ag.
Across a variety of acreage representing land in different local water districts, price data show valuations were unchanged on the lower end of prices and mostly steady on the upper end.
The overall stability is notable if only because farmland has generally slid in recent years under pressure from the recent drought and tough economic times for growers of almonds, table grapes and other local commodities.
Among few changes from the fourth quarter of last year was a significant bump in citrus acreage at the upper end and a rare decline in pistachio land at the higher range of prices.
Another shift evident during the historically wet first quarter was that high-end values climbed for land in areas served by the Kern River, as well as acreage served by the federal Central Valley Project water conveyance system.
Alliance principal Mike Ming offered some interpretation of the numbers, noting in an email Friday that pistachio land values had jumped as a replacement for almond investments. He said that trend appears to have moderated.
“Investors moved focus from almonds to pistachios creating a short term bubble, which is subsiding,” Ming wrote.
He added that ag fund managers he hears from are waiting to see what happens between now and the first quarter of next year, when expectations are that values will dip and thereby become more attractive for purchase.
“In ag real estate you see originally overpriced listings being reduced aggressively,” he stated. “Investors don’t want to catch a falling knife as they know there could be additional downside risk.”
Verizon this week announced substantial upgrades to its
Bakersfield mobile network as part of a years-long redesign intended to extend local coverage, speed and capacity.
The cellular service carrier said in a news release Tuesday it has deployed new cell sites that add capacity on its fiber optic cables and increase the bandwidth of its local network to support new services such as wireless internet service for residential and business customers.
Its engineers in Bakersfield have rolled out 5G Ultra Wideband throughout the area, Verizon’s release said, deploying the service at 88 percent of local cell sites, in addition to adding five new macro cell sites and a number of small cells around the city.
The company said that besides increasing its C-band spectrum, it is also widening access to high speeds and greater capacity by deploying 5G service using what’s called Millimeter Wave spectrum.
“By the end of the year, customers in Bakersfield will be able to take advantage of even more spectrum as it becomes available for 5G Ultra Wideband,” it stated.