Georgia Labor Commissioner Mark Butler said Thursday that the Central Savannah River region added more employed residents in December.

Preliminary numbers show the 13-county region posted monthly gains in labor force and annual gains in initial claims for December.

“Georgia finished the year strong by continuing to add jobs in all major sectors,” Butler said. “Moving forward, we need to attract more people to the workforce, so we can fill these great jobs.”

In the CSR region, the unemployment rate increased in December to 3.4 percent, a slight rise of 0.2 percentage points. A year ago, the rate was 4.3 percent.  

The labor force increased in December by 633. The December total was 210,215. That number is down by 1,203 from the total from December 2018.

Central Savannah River ended December with 203,134 employed residents.  The number increased by 324 in December and was up 873 as compared to last year.

The number of unemployment claims increased in December by about 125 percent. When compared to last December, claims were down by about 3 percent.