Is help on the way for struggling Scott County? Les Winningham thinks so.

Winningham, long-time state representative from Huntsville, says to “expect some announcements” from the state in the coming days about jobs help for Scott County.

“It won’t put everyone back to work and not everyone will have a great job, but there are going to be some opportunities,” Winningham said, as he escorted Democratic gubernatorial candidate Mike McWherter to Oneida.

Great Dane Trailers laid off 19 workers at its Huntsville plant earlier this month, and now closure of the plant is apparently pending.

Confirming a rumor that had been circulating in recent days, Scott County Mayor Rick Keeton acknowledged earlier this week that his office has received notification from the state Dept. of Labor & Workforce Development that Great Dane has filed notice that it will layoff its remaining work force in Huntsville in March.

The move comes on the heels of an announcement that Armstrong is closing most of its Oneida plant, which will cost the county 260 jobs.

Meanwhile, Armstrong officials aren’t confirming or denying rampant speculation that the remainder of the Oneida plant—representing another 110 jobs—will close in early 2011.

The economic situation in Scott County is quickly going from depressing to downright frightening.

Scott County’s jobless rate dropped to 17.8% in October, making it fourth-highest in the state. Just two months ago, we were the highest in the state.

“Only” fourth-highest . . . it’s amazing what you can find to be thankful about in a recession, huh?

Scott County’s unemployment rate is now the state’s highest (19.6%).

Lucky us.

Reports this evening indicate that National Coal Company has laid off 50 workers (the 2nd shift) at Mine No. 14 near Devonia, in rural northern Anderson County.

NCC is a major player in Tennessee’s coal industry, operating mines in Campbell, Claiborne and Anderson counties, in addition to Scott. Coal from the Devonia mines is shipped to the washer by train on the former Tennessee Railway, which runs from Devonia to Oneida and connects with Norfolk-Southern.

NCC’s subsidiary in Alabama recently announced that it is defaulting on a major credit line, which is expected to lead to bankruptcy. However, the company insists that its Tennessee operations remain solid. The mines near Devonia have been near playing out.

According to the latest employment numbers released this afternoon by the Tennessee Dept. of Labor & Workforce Development, the manufacturing industry continues to lose jobs at a pace of nearly 1,000 per week.

In the May-to-June reporting period, the statewide economy shed 3,900 manufacturing jobs. That brings the yearly total (June 2008 through June 2009) to 51,000 manufacturing jobs lost in Tennessee.

Manufacturing continues to be the hardest-hit sector of Tennessee’s economy (educational services lost a total of some 28,000 jobs in June, but that was primarily due to school ending for the summer).

Tennessee’s unemployment rate for the month of June was 10.8%, almost identical to May’s rate of 10.7%.

The good news (I guess) is that Scott County’s unemployment rate is no longer 2nd-highest in the state. Lauderdale County has taken that honor away from us, and they can have it. The bad news is that our jobless rate is still climbing, up from 18.2% to 18.6% in May (Lauderdale’s was 19.2%).

By the numbers: The current statistics show a local workforce of 8,460, with 6,890 employed and 1,580 unemployed.

Tennessee’s unemployment rate jumped to double-digits last month, according to figures released today by the Dept. of Labor & Workforce Development.

Not that it had far to go.

The May jobless rate climbed eight-tenths of a point from 9.9% to 10.7%, LWD Commissioner James Neeley announced.

This comment from Neeley is very important. It helps hammer home something that we’ve been harping about since day one here:

“Our goods-producing sector, which includes manufacturing and construction, only makes up about 16 percent of Tennessee’s economy.  Those industries, however, have seen more than half of the total job losses in the past year.

As the nation’s manufacturing industry continues to shrink, could Tennessee’s wind up on life support as the auto industry crumbles? In an emailed statement, U.S. Sen. Lamar Alexander (R - Tenn.) spells out just how important the auto industry is to the Volunteer State:

Today, nearly 150,000 jobs—or about one third of Tennessee’s manufacturing jobs—are auto-related, almost all of them at suppliers to the twelve auto-assembly plants that now are located in the southeastern United States.

All the guys I hunt with say that I am a curse. Well, the cursed, I reckon, are afflicted in many different ways. My latest infirmity is, I have forgotten how to shoot. Until opening day back on March 27, it had been nearly 10 years since I had missed a shot at a turkey. In fact, I could easily count the number of times I had missed a big game animal with a firearm over the past 10 years — once at a deer with a muzzleloader, once at a turkey with a shotgun. But this year? A totally different story.

It’s been a very unusual season. I’ve heard less gobbling this year than I have in all my 15 years of hunting turkeys. I believe that’s simply due to the population of birds being way down in the areas I hunt. But I have managed to put myself in a number of positive situations. Part of that is by playing it smart (no wisecrack comments, please) and getting into areas where turkeys are most likely to be at whichever time of day it is that I happen to be hunting. A larger part is listening for the tell-tale phhhht-vrrooooooom sound of a tom turkey spitting and drumming. When it comes to turkey vocalizations, the gobble is a glory-hog. The spit-and-drum is equally, if not more, important. Because on a morning when a turkey isn’t gobbling, he’ll still be spitting and drumming if he’s strutting. The tone and pitch of this sound are such that a good many hunters cannot heari t. Others can only hear it at very close distances. While my directional hearing is bad, I’m blessed to be able to hear the spit-and-drum at distances of a little more than 100 yards before the woods have greened out, and a little less than that after. I may not be able to tell exactly where it’s coming from, but I can hear it. Anyway, I’m digressing. The point is that I should have filled all four of my Tennessee tags a long time ago. But stupidity and my gun (and, on at least one occasion, both) have prevented that from happening.

Take this morning, for example. Often times I don’t decide where I’m going until I pull out of the driveway. This morning, I decided to head to a little ridge on the edge of the Big South Fork NRRA to give one more chase to what has become a season-wrecker (those wily old birds that entrance a hunter and cause him to waste an entire season chasing them). I’ve taken to calling him The Early Bird because he flies off the roost so early — well before the other birds — each morning. And he usually roosts alone, even if there are hens nearby. Three times he has been chased across the ridge, and three times he’s lived to go back and laugh about it to his harem of hens. This morning was the same, unfortunately (for me, at least; I’m sure he feels differently).

I was easing along the ridge as the day broke, not hearing anything but songbirds. Any turkey hunter knows exactly the kind of morning I’m talking about. You’re wishing you had stayed in bed, or gone on into work, etc. Then, finally: Gaaaaarrrble. A gobble from way down the ridge. I’m sure he’d been gobbling since the first crack of light, but I wasn’t close enough to hear it. I started pulling my face net and gloves out of my vest pocket and set off in the direction of the gobbles, not thinking it was the same bird I had hunted before. He wasn’t roosted in his usual area, for one thing. For another, this gobble sounded somewhat different.

As I crested the hill near where I thought he would be, he gobbled for the sixth time. &$(#!, I was right on top of him (yes, I cursed under my breath; yes, it’s little wonder I missed after that). I glanced at the terrain and decided right quick that when he came out of the tree, he was going to come out in a different direction. So I needed to get back out of sight and circle around him. As I was doing that, he never gobbled again. I figured he had saw me when I got too close. Then, as I was easing into position, I looked down and there, 50 yards away, was a tom turkey in full strut. No wonder he had stopped gobbling; he had flown down off the roost already, even though it was way early. Early Bird! At 50 yards and in full strut, spitting and drumming.

All those thoughts went through the right lobe of my brain at the speed of lightning. The left lobe of my brain was uttering another four-letter word and screaming “sit!”, which I did. But I was leaning awkwardly against the side of the tree. I needed to be flat against the tree. I managed to scoot around while he was behind a tree that was between us, took out my Primos cutter box and yelped twice. The game was on. There was another hen, as it turned out, out of sight on down the ridge and calling to him. It became a battle between her and I, but I was closer, and I won. Thank goodness for small victories, anyway.

Early Bird continued to strut and spit and drum 40 yards from me, and I was torn up. I had the springtime version of “buck fever” in a bad way. A turkey inside 50 paces putting on a show is a sight to behold, and what makes turkey hunting fun. It’ll also make you a nervous wreck if you don’t have nerves of steel. And I don’t. That old bird came to within 25 yards of me before he cleared the brush and gave me a shot. A turkey’s head is smaller than a baseball, but we have the advantage because we’re toting a gun loaded with scatter shot. All it takes is one well-placed pellet in that walnut-sized brain to have fresh turkey breast strips for supper. But, as I’ve found out more than once this year, easier said than done. I missed. Again. The sad part of it was that he didn’t spook. But I did. I had already jumped up and jacked another shell in my gun, hoping to get another shot at him before he flew. If I had stayed on my seat, I could’ve probably worked him for another try after he had run across the ridge and then stopped. But because I was already standing, I had no choice but to go ahead and pull the trigger again. It was still an easy shot. But nothing happened when I pulled the trigger. As I jumped up, I had subconsciously put the safety back on (at least I did something right, even if I didn’t realize it). And ol’ Early Bird took off over the side of the hill as fast as his two legs would carry him.

The good news is that I’m down to two shells. Turkey loads are expensive and I have no intention of buying any more this spring, so maybe I can hang up my gun and put an end to this wretched season. Or maybe I need to go to the range and learn how to shoot all over again. Or maybe I’ll sell my beautifully camouflaged Remington 870. I’ve had nothing but trouble since I got it. I had much more luck with a scratched up old Winchester 1100 with a barrel that was about 75 inches long.