After the 2007 housing market crash, many skilled workers left Douglas County to find work elsewhere, but not enough have come to replace them.
“What we have now as the market is getting going again is a whole crop of new guys coming into the market that don’t necessarily have the experience,” housing developer Tim Drechsel said. “It’s tough to even find guys now because it’s a heavy manual labor type position, so getting them trained and getting them to show up on time and clean, it’s a huge issue.”
Construction employment in the county grew with the national housing bubble between 2000 and 2006 to reach 2,060 jobs, according to Regional Economist Annette Shelton-Tiderman. After the number of permits began dropping with the market crash, construction employment slowed slightly as local contractors finished the projects they had already started.
Read more at the Roseburg News Review.
