Kansas Secretary of Labor Jim Garner on Friday gave his annual State of Labor assessment at the Capitol. Kansas has a 7.7 percent unemployment rate, the highest since January 1983.

Topeka ? 1:45 p.m. Want to know what Gov. Mark Parkinson, or any other state employee makes?

The salary information is now available on KanView, the online web site that provides access to state government financial data.

The site is www.kansas.gov/KanView/.

12:22 p.m. Kansas Department of Labor Secretary Jim Garner today gave a sobering assessment of the economy in his annual state of labor address.

The state unemployment rate of 7.7 percent is the highest it has been since January 1983.

More than 100,000 Kansans are receiving unemployment benefits, compared with 23,000 this time last year.

Kansas has lost 30,000 jobs since April.

And by the end of the year, the state’s unemployment trust fund will likely be depleted. If that happens, Kansas will have to borrow from the feds to pay off unemployment claims.

“This recession has imposed the greatest burden on our unemployment insurance system since it was created more than 70 years ago,” Garner said.

But Garner said it appears the economy is starting to recover, and that the state may be poised to take advantage of renewable energy jobs in the future.

He said legislation approved this year that extends jobless benefits to those in approved training programs will pay off in the long run “as it prepares those who are out of work to fill high-demand positions.”

9:30 a.m.The Kansas Republican Party is expressing displeasure over approximately 1,000 letters sent by Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation Secretary Don Jordan and Department on Aging Acting Secretary Martin Kennedy to social service providers doing business with the state

These letters request the names, addresses and telephone numbers of employees, and that information will be then given to the Service Employees International Union, or SEIU, a politically active union.

Michelle Ponce, a spokeswoman for SRS, said the agency was responding to a request made by SEIU under the Kansas Open Records Act.

“SEIU is requesting the information about employees so that they will have a means to distribute information to them. We have no opinion as to what the employee should or should not do after receiving the information, but do believe it is good for employees to have access to it,” Ponce said.

The state agencies say they will ensure that the information will be not used for marketing purposes and that SEIU will be picking up the expense of this request.

The Kansas Trunkline, which is decscribed as the official blog of the state Republican Party, said the letters were “unsettling.”

The blog raised questions about what this information was going to be used for and why was SEIU getting “special treatment.”