The largest number of local job openings heading into 2004 will be in the retail and health care industries, according to the results of a recent survey by the Buffalo Niagara Partnership's Workforce Development Council.

Job hunters will find plenty of openings in positions such as retail sales, home health aide and medical diagnostic technician, according to the fourth annual "WNY Works" survey.

The results seem to provide little good news for hundreds of area residents laid off from manufacturing jobs in recent months. Retail and health care jobs tend to pay less than manufacturing.

But John Slenker, a regional economist for the New York State Department of Labor, warns against drawing too many conclusions from the survey.

"One of the reasons I don't find that surprising is because of the size of those industries," Slenker said. "If you look at occupational projections nationally, you're going to see the same things."

National work force statistics track similar results. U.S. service industries grew at the second fastest pace ever in August, according to the results of a study released Friday by the national Institute for Supply Management.

The Western New York survey does not mean there will be no openings in manufacturing, construction or other "goods producing" sectors, Slenker said.

The Buffalo Niagara Partnership, a business membership group, conducted the survey with help from the New York State Department of Labor, the Buffalo and Erie County Workforce Investment Board and the Niagara County Workforce Investment Board.

The Internet and telephone survey drew responses from 1,000 businesses, which projected a total of 4,733 job openings in January. The retail industry accounted for 1,530 positions and health care attributed 1,231 projected openings.

Other sectors projecting a large number of openings included personal services, such as auto mechanics, and business services, such as legal assistants and accountants.

"This gave us a high level overview, to take the temperature out there," said Charles B. Ohl, a local human resources manager who chairs the BNP's Workforce Development Council.

Ohl said the council now hopes to bore deeper into the subject by seeking more detailed information on the kinds of skills employers are seeking. The ultimate goal is to use the information to help the work force investment boards, which administer federal training grants, make decisions about training programs.

Paul Parise, director of the Niagara County Employment and Training Center, said the key is matching training opportunities for the unemployed with the demand occupations.

For example, the Niagara County Workforce Investment Board has contracts with six truck driving schools and it pays for qualified applicants to become truckers.

"That's one of the industries where workers can replace those lost manufacturing wages. Now, the downside of that is you have to be on the road a lot and be away from your family," Parise said.

He said the manufacturing decline is more of a U.S. problem than a local problem, and the region is just going to have to adapt.

"In Buffalo and Niagara Falls, nobody is going to come and sprinkle magic dust on us to make all our problems go away. We're going to have to make this work ourselves. We're going to have to take advantage of the opportunities that we do have and those opportunities are with employers such as TeleTech (a telephone service center in Niagara Falls) and Seneca Niagara Casino," Parise said.


E-mail: cbridger@buffnews.com