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Friday Governor Rick Scott, joined by Department of Economic Opportunity (DEO) Executive Director Doug Darling, announced that Florida’s unemployment rate for September is 10.6 percent, down 1.3 percentage points since January 2011.

Florida’s unemployment rates over the last five months are at the lowest since August 2009. In contrast, the national unemployment rate has gone up 0.1percentage point during the same five-month period.

Florida has already begun to reap the benefits of a smaller, less-costly government and more business friendly environment, as evidenced by the 110,300 private sector jobs added since January. Florida has had a net gain of 92,400 jobs during the same time period with a net gain of 23,300 jobs in September alone. In addition, Florida’s 12-month job growth percentage rate, of 1.3 percent has outpaced the nation for the first time since 2007.

Citrus County has seen another drop in its unemployment rate that is not seasonally adjusted. The September unemployment rate is 11.6 percent which is only down from 11.9% in August.  This little increase is really only a net of about one hundred jobs, leaving 6,771 people out of work in the county. These numbers do not reflect people that have given up on jobs and are no longer in the “system” to be counted.

Local Area Unemployment Statistics (Not Seasonally Adjusted)

In September 2011, Monroe County has the state’s lowest unemployment rate (6.7 percent), followed by Liberty County (6.9 percent), Walton County (7.1 percent), Okaloosa County (7.3 percent), and Franklin County (7.8 percent). Many of the counties with the lowest unemployment rates are those with relatively high proportions of government employment.

Hendry County has the highest unemployment rate (17.6 percent) in Florida in September 2011, followed by Flagler County (14.6 percent), Indian River County (13.7 percent), Hernando County (13.5 percent), and St. Lucie County (13.4 percent). Seasonal declines in agriculture and layoffs in state government contributed to Hendry County’s high unemployment rate. There are 41 Florida counties with double-digit unemployment rates in September. Citrus County was ranked as having the 17^th highest unemployment rate in the state.

To read the full LMS report visit: http://www.floridajobs.org/publications/news_rel/LMS%20Release%2010-21-11%20%282%29.pdf