Nov. 18--PANAMA CITY -- Bay County's unemployment rate has held steady for the past few months, but recent layoffs announced by Smurfit-Stone Container Corp., Oceaneering Multiflexandahostofotherlarge area employers soon will drive that number up, the Gulf Coast Workforce Board's executive director said Monday.

Kim Bodine, executive director of the Gulf Coast Workforce Board, said Workforce Center coordinator Wilson Hair made contact with Smurfit-Stone on Monday. She said 425 Smurfit-Stone employees would be affected by the company's temporary Panama City paper mill shutdown, which begins Nov. 22.

Bay County's unemployment rate stood at 5.6 percent in September, lower than the state and national averages. The Florida Agency for Workforce Innovation is scheduled to announce the state's October unemployment numbers Friday.

Bodine said some area companies with announced layoffs, such as Century Boat Company, will show up in October's numbers. Other companies, such as Smurfit-Stone and Oceaneering, will see their layoffs registered in AWI's November unemployment figures, which will be released in mid-December.

"We'll see a big spike in unemployment then," Bodine said on Monday.

Hair said Smurfit-Stone's human resources department requested the Workforce Center come out to the plant this week to answer questions related to unemployment and filing for benefits. He emphasized that Smurfit-Stone officials told him that, as far as they knew, the layoffs would be temporary and "everybody was coming back" after the holidays.

Repeated efforts to reach Mike Mullin, Smurfit-Stone's director of media relations and public affairs, were unsuccessful Monday.

Bodine said that, in addition to Smurfit-Stone, Oceaneering and Century Boat, other area companies that had informed the Workforce Center of planned temporary or permanent job cuts since October included Circuit City (42 jobs), Stock Building Supply (30), Trane (87) and Berg Steel Pipe (58).

Circuit City and Stock Building Supply have announced the closing of their Panama City locations.

Linen N' Things also has announced it would be closing its Panama City Mall location, but Bodine said she did not have an exact figure on the store's number of employees.

In a related note, Bodine said the AWI has hired an additional 200 staffers statewide to process unemployment claims.

Florida's unemployment rate registered 6.8 percent in September.

"This is happening across Florida. They can't keep up with the claims coming in," Bodine said.

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