A Southwest Washington-based workforce development group presented year-end results to the Board of Lewis County Commissioners this week, announcing that the group helped employ 22 people in Lewis County and more than 300 across five counties.
Pacific Mountain Workforce Development Council CEO William Westmoreland presented the nonprofit’s 2024-2025 yearly reports to the Lewis County commissioners during a regular business meeting on Tuesday morning.
Westmoreland presented data on the organization’s performance in the last year, including pointing out that the organization has excelled in training people in hirable skills compared with other areas, but added the group would like to help more of the people receive credentials to make future job searches easier.
“Another key indicator of performance at the federal level is credentials issued,” Westmoreland said. “This is a bit lower than we’d like to see. About 332 trained. We want to see them getting occupational credentials so that it helps them with their job search.”
Westmoreland also presented data specific to Lewis County, including information on the sectors of Lewis County that are seeing growth and others that might be shrinking.
According to the group’s regional impact report for 2024-2025, Lewis County has seen job growth in production, health care and health care practitioner and tech sectors. On the flip side, sales and related jobs as well as construction and extraction and educational instruction and libraries have seen reductions in workforces.
Pacific Mountain Workforce Development Council is a Thurston County-based nonprofit organization that looks to recruit and train employees for local employers in need of help. The organization is based in Thurston County but serves Thurston, Lewis, Pacific, Grays Harbor and Mason counties.
According to the report presented by Westmoreland, the majority of people served by the group in its service area lived in Grays Harbor and Thurston counties. However, Pacific Mountain did provide “intensive services” to 45 individuals in Lewis County and basic services to 32 individuals while helping employ 22 individuals.
According to the same report, 12 of those employed went to work in the manufacturing and logistics sector with an average wage of $26.30 an hour. Another four went to work in the forest and wood products industry with an average wage of $24.50 an hour; and, finally, five more went to work in the health care sector with an average wage of $19.83.
“We’re trying to elevate opportunities in the communities where people live,” Westmoreland said. “Often what we’ve seen when we do data and research is people expect that they have to travel to Tacoma or north to get a great job. We have great jobs right here in each of the five counties that we serve.”
Across the entire region, the organization employed 329 people and provided training to 332 people. The group also engaged with 598 employers in the Southwest Washington region last year. The group held six hiring events.
“We are a demand-driven system, which means we are here to serve employers,” Westmoreland said. “The way we serve employers is making sure that people who are looking for work have the skillsets that employers in their communities are looking for.”
The Pacific Mountain Work Force Development Council 2024-2025 reports are available to the public on the nonprofit’s website. Visit https://tinyurl.com/yckenjxd to learn more.
