Editor’s Note: This story has been updated to included corrected data for nonfarm payroll jobs growth in L.A. County; the original seasonally adjusted data supplied by Beacon Economics was incorrect.

Los Angeles County continued its slow march out of the recession in April, according to state figures released Friday.

Despite the jobs gain, the county’s unemployment rate was unchanged from March at 12.3 percent in April, according to the state Employment Development Department. A year ago, the unemployment rate was 11.2 percent.

While 20,000 more county residents reported finding work in April, nearly as many people also resumed looking for work, thus adding numbers to unemployment.

The county’s two largest cities, Los Angeles and Long Beach reported unemployment rates topping 13 percent.

California’s unemployment rate was also unchanged in April at 11.9 percent, while the national unemployment rate rose in April to 9.9 percent from 9.7 percent.

The county added 1,500 nonfarm payroll jobs in April to bring the total to 3,777,300, for an increase of 0.1 percent, according to seasonal adjustments to the state data made by Beacon Economics. The non-adjusted data from the state showed a gain of only 400 jobs, virtually unchanged from March.

The hotel and food service industries added about 2,000 jobs each, but that was offset by drops in wholesale and retail trade. The government sector added 3,400 jobs due to the hiring of temporary federal census workers.

The closely watched year-over-year payroll jobs figures are also continuing to show improvement. The county shed 83,000 jobs between April 2009 and April 2010, for a drop of 2.1 percent. However, a year ago, the year-over-year job loss was almost twice as large.

Over the past year, the manufacturing sector has shed the most jobs, reducing payrolls by 24,000 jobs. With the local real estate market still in the doldrums, construction employment fell 18,000 jobs over the past year.

Local government payrolls also shrank by 16,000 jobs, with most of those coming from local school districts.

The entertainment industry showed the biggest gains, adding nearly 20,000 payroll jobs. Private educational services added 6,100 jobs as many long-term unemployed residents returned to school.