Montgomery celebrates nearly 2,000 jobs created this year

MONTGOMERY, AL (WSFA) - At Tuesday's Montgomery City Council meeting Mayor Todd Strange detailed thousands of new jobs that were created this year.

In all, 43 companies either expanded or opened, creating a total of 1,940 new jobs, according the mayor.

That helped bring the city's unemployment rate down to 5.4 percent.

In fact Montgomery was responsible for about 30 percent of all new jobs in the state of Alabama.

Companies like ALFA, Baptist Health and Jackson Hospital expanded this year - something the mayor is very happy about.

"We want to celebrate that existing industry, and we also want to celebrate those new companies that come. I wanted to show the council in addition to those numbers the labor force is expanding by three thousand jobs this year. And we have 3,149 more people employed this year than we did last year. All of them take care of their families and buys groceries and automobiles and things like that, so that's pushing and compelling Montgomery forward," Strange said.

The city also saw almost $412 million of capital expenditures made this year.

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