Latest Employment figures for Columbia and Greene Counties

If you want more numbers (and who doesn't?) than were on offer in this story, you can look at the Labor Department's State and Area Unemployment Rates here. Otherwise, know this: Columbia County remains among the counties with the lowest unemployment rate in the state at 4.5% in September, while Greene County's unemployment rate was 5.7%. Both counties saw significant reductions in their unemployment rates from the previous September, dropping from 5.9% and 7.4%, respectively. Unfortunately, in both cases, although the number of unemployed fell, so did the number of employed. The former outweighed the latter in both counties, thus the reduction in the unemployment rate. In September there were about 400 fewer unemployed, but also 300 fewer employed in Columbia County, while in Greene County there were also 400 fewer unemployed with only 100 fewer employed. So, once again, lower unemployment rates hide something else: either people leaving the county or just leaving the workforce.

More interesting discussions of Ginsberg's

This past Wednesday, October 15, the Columbia County Industrial Development Agency (IDA) held a meeting at which the Payment in Lieu of Taxes arrangement for the facility being proposed by Ginsberg's in Ghent and Claverack was to be discussed. As predicted, it was well attended. A large crowd showed up, many of whom were Ginsberg's employees or people who work with Ginsberg's. Ken Flood in his role as IDA Executive Director, asserted that the project would create $10 in benefits for the county for each dollar of incentives. The main points made by opponents of the PILOT for this project is that it wasn't at all clear that Ginsberg's needed it. David Ginsberg cited an example of a competitor receiving $18.5 million in tax breaks to build a comparable facility. Residents argued that the deal would pace a burden on school and property tax payers. The latter is a little fuzzy, since there's no one paying taxes on the property now. The proposed deal means that that would continue for the first six years, with payments kicking in afterwards. More will be revealed, I guess. No word yet when a final decision will be made.