POST FALLS - Kootenai County's unemployment rate in February remained unchanged from January at 4.9 percent, according to an Idaho Department of Labor report released on Friday.

"Everything continues to look up for Kootenai County," said Alivia Metts, a Labor regional economist. "Commercial growth as well as health care are driving a lot of construction activity around the area."

The local unemployment rate last year at this time was 6.3 percent.

There were 1,073 job openings from January to February this year, Metts said.

"As we head into spring - the seasonal hiring months - we will see the number of jobs available continue to climb," she said. "Job openings are already 12.4 percent up from the same first three months in 2014."

Metts said two recent job fairs at the Labor office were a success.

"We had a great turnout from both sides - employers as well as job-seekers," she said.

The next job fair is 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., April 15, at Real Life Ministries in Post Falls. As many as 50 employers are expected to attend.

"All indicators are directing to sunshine over the coming months and through the year," said Metts, referring to the job front.

Idaho's unemployment rate dropped two-tenths of a percent to 3.9 percent in February. It's the lowest rate since March 2008.

The nation's rate fell to 5.5 percent from 5.7. February was the 66th straight month that Idaho's jobless rate has been below the national rate.

Goods production jobs in Idaho slipped slightly from the normal February level - mainly in construction - while service sector employers added more than 7,000 jobs, the report states. That shifted the statewide labor force another two-tenths of a point into services, which accounted for 85.3 percent of all jobs.

New hires slipped below the 2013 level for the first time since last August, and the Conference Board, a Washington, D.C., think tank, estimated there were three jobless workers in Idaho for every two posted job openings.

Idaho's labor force expanded for the second straight month, attracting 3,800 more workers. That lifted the labor force participation rate - the percent of working-age adults with jobs or looking for work - two-tenths of a point to 63.1 percent. It was the second monthly increase in a row, ending a downward slide since the rate was more than 66 percent in June 2009.

None of Idaho's 44 counties posted a double-digit unemployment rate for the 10th straight month.