Pueblo is making great strides toward shrinking its unemployment numbers but housing, inflation and a few other factors could be preventing more job growth.

According to the Colorado State Department of Labor and Employment, Pueblo County has the seventh-highest unemployment rate in the state, a far cry from the top three spots the county lingered in during the post-pandemic era.

Pueblo has just a 4.4% unemployment rate. That rate was 11.7% in April 2020 in the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic and shrank to 6.4% by the end of 2021 and 3.7% by the end of 2022.

In fact, Pueblo is nearing its all-time low unemployment rate of 3.6%, which it hit at the end of 2019. Labor department figures show that 73,329 people are working in Pueblo County and just 3,340 are out of work.

As Pueblo Economic Development Corp. staff work to draw new businesses and industry to the area, “workforce is a challenge,” said Jeff Shaw, executive director, pointing out Pueblo may not have enough workers available to support larger projects.

“There are a lot of projects we are working on” to bring in new business, he said. “But the challenge is still there with the workforce, the spike in inflation rates and supply chain issues.”

When Bechtel wraps up chemical weapon destruction later this fall at the Pueblo Chemical Depot and “the project goes offline, there will be businesses looking to tap into that workforce,” Shaw said.

More on jobs:Mottet: Investing in Pueblo

Pueblo's housing situation could be slowing job growth

Another challenge Pueblo faces in the jobs growth arena is its housing situation, said Duane Nava, Greater Pueblo Chamber of Commerce executive director.

“Our business growth is outpacing our population growth and that is an issue," Nava said. "We still have a lot of employers who are hurting for employees but with the low unemployment rate, it means we need to figure out how to get housing to a point where it is available and affordable, and how to attract people to come to live here."

“We have figured out how to get people to come to visit. Our tourism has been up year over year for the last number of years, but how do we attract people to come and live? There are a few ‘black eyes’ that Pueblo faces,” Nava said.

"Pueblo is a great city, but our crime is on the rise a little bit. Law enforcement is doing a great job, but they are 50 officers short."

"We need, as a community, to support them and help get it back to where it should be for the citizens of Pueblo,” Nava said. “That will start attracting more people to come here and that will start attracting more businesses to come here."

When Pueblo had high unemployment, employers were struggling to find workers, Nava said.

“Right now, we have a lower unemployment rate but people are still struggling to find workforce; that means our population isn’t there. So, we really have to figure that out because we can’t bring these large companies in if we don’t have the population to support them,” Nava said.

Shaw agrees “there are still jobs available, but there is work to be done,” in terms of job training workers to “upscale” their qualifications for the open spots.

In the past year, one of the largest employers to add more jobs was CS Wind, which manufactures large wind turbine towers. Shaw said the company still has plans for expansion this year.

“EVRAZ (Rocky Mountain Steel Mill) is still the largest manufacturing employer with over 1,000 jobs and Trane and the aerospace industry also are part of the top four in manufacturing," Shaw said. "Parkview Health System is still the largest private employer and the school districts also are top employers."

According to the city of Pueblo's economic and workforce development dashboard, there were 281 total available job openings at ParkviewHealth System and 69 at Pueblo City School District 60.

More on CS Wind:CS Wind's plans for Pueblo turbine plant include tripling workforce, two new buildings

Chieftain reporter Tracy Harmon covers business news. She can be reached by email at tharmon@chieftain.com or via Twitter at twitter.com/tracywumps.

This article originally appeared on The Pueblo Chieftain: Pueblo unemployment rate continues to improve: What to know