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THE BULLETIN • SUNDAY, APRIL 18, 2021
Weddings can be added to long list of hard-hit industries during the pandemic
BY MICHAEL KOHN
B
The Bulletin
efore the pandemic upended the
live events industry, Courtney
Latham organized the entertain­
ment for about 100 weddings a
year. Brides and grooms danced
the night away to the sounds spun by his
company Flip Flop Sounds.
Last year, that number was down to 10.
Couples are still tying the knot, COVID-19
hasn’t ended that tradition. But due to
state-ordered limits on how many people can
crowd together indoors, large weddings that
draw guests in their hundreds were almost
non-existent last year. The lack of the tradi­
tional wedding bash has torpedoed work for
DJs, wedding planners, venues and florists.
Latham said it has been discouraging to
cancel the party for many happy couples
looking forward to their big day.
“My biggest fear was that we weren’t go­
ing to be there for all the customers who had
booked with us and hoped to have us at their
wedding,” said Latham. “That scared me
more than anything else.”
Despite a steady stream of vaccinations go­
ing into the arms of Oregonians, Latham and
others say considerable uncertainty still sur­
rounds the wedding industry, mainly due to
the possibility of moving back to stricter risk
categories.
Robin Bernard
helps Courtney
Dickinson with
a wedding dress
at Cordially
Invited Bridal in
Bend.
Dean Guernsey/
The Bulletin
See Weddings / C8
Oregon’s labor gap: The next big hurdle in pandemic
W
ith the hope that our
risk level setback
from spring break
will pass quickly, businesses
are gearing up for the summer
and our long-awaited emer­
gence from COVID-19. And as
restaurants, the entertainment
and recreation industry, hos­
pitality and others prepare for
more customers, they are find­
ing that a lack of labor is their
next big hurdle to overcome.
According to the Oregon
Employment Department,
INSIDE
BUSINESS
By Katy Brooks
Deschutes County has now re­
covered around 11,350 of the
16,400 jobs lost since the initial
shutdown. This still represents
double the unemployment
numbers since pre-pandemic
days in Oregon and they are
finding that there are underly­
ing issues to getting everyone
back to work.
Heather Ficht, director of
East Cascade Works, a state
workforce agency, says there are
labor gaps in Central Oregon
that are more persistent than
the effects of the pandemic. She
believes this is a trend that will
carry into the future unless we
prepare the workforce. “We not
only need to address the short­
age of labor today but plan for
the expectation of about 16,500
new jobs in our region in the
next 10 years,” she said
The Central Oregon Work­
force Innovation and Oppor­
tunity Plan found job vacancy
trends are more prevalent in
certain industries and specific
skill sets that are lacking for dif-
ficult-to-fill positions. These
gaps may impact the work­
force for years to come. Ficht
thinks much of the problem is
due to a shrinking labor pool.
“This is a warm body issue:
there is a high demand for la­
bor relative to very few workers
unemployed or sitting on the
sidelines,” she said. The exit of
Baby Boomers from the work­
force is one of the largest cul­
prits for this impending labor
shortage. Ficht says training
and skills development of the
incoming workforce is needed
now to help close the growing
labor gap.
Short-term job vacancies
are also causing havoc. Many
in the current workforce is
delaying reentry to the job
market, exacerbating the la­
bor shortage many businesses
are experiencing. Part of the
issue may be that those with
public-facing jobs are worried
about exposure to COVID-19.
However, with more employ­
ees, including front-line work­
ers, having recently become
eligible for a vaccine fears of ex­
posure to COVID-19 may de­
crease, encouraging people to
come back to work Businesses
can help by asking employees
to get vaccinated and making it
convenient for them to do so.
See Brooks / C8