Western Pennsylvania won't have the talent to fill its employment needs if the region does not diversify its workforce, contributors to a minority employment report released Thursday said.

The younger workforce lacks more than 100,000 people to fill jobs the retiring workforce will leave open, said Jim Futrell, a vice president at the Allegheny Conference on Community Development and one of the contributors to the report.

“I think those who look forward and leaders who look forward realize that it's going to hold us back,” Greg Spencer, CEO of Randall Industries, said of the workforce's low minority presence. “At some point, if we don't address it, we're not going to have the talent available. ... If we don't do this, we're not going to take advantage of the talent that is here.”

Minorities make up 11 percent of Western Pennsylvania's workforce, ranking it last among the 15 metropolitan regions analyzed in the Pittsburgh Regional Workforce Diversity Indicators Report, a study funded by the Heinz Endowments. Racial and ethnic minorities make up less than 14 percent of Western Pennsylvania's population, according to the most recent census data.

Melanie Harrington, president and CEO of Vibrant Pittsburgh, a contributor to the report, said Western Pennsylvania has trouble with recruiting, retaining and promoting minorities. She said minorities don't see people like them succeeding, so they leave.

Spencer said there are opportunities for minorities to succeed, but they need to be more visible.

He is a member of the Corporate Equity & Inclusion Roundtable, an initiative started by Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald in 2013 to diversify the county's workforce. Working groups formed by the roundtable continue to meet and will convene again in May, Spencer said.

The region has to “make sure that we continue to reach out to people and continue to add diversity to what we have,” Fitzgerald said during a discussion held to mark the report's release.

The report found:

• Minorities make up 5 percent of the construction, mining and oil and gas workforce but 16 percent of the accommodation and food service workforce.

• African-American workers earn about $1,400 less a month than white workers. Hispanic workers earn about $400 less a month than white workers. Asian workers earn about $2,200 more a month than white workers.

• The share of minority jobs in the workforce grows by about 2 percent a year.

“When you consider that we are starting from a starting point way behind the others, that average growth won't do,” said Douglas Heuck, director of Pittsburgh Today, a contributor to the report.

Heuck said Western Pennsylvania did not benefit from an influx of immigration in the 1980s as its economy collapsed.

The data should not come as a surprise to business leaders trying to recruit and hire minorities, said Candi Castleberry Singleton, head of UPMC's Center for Engagement and Inclusion.

Her solution is both simple and difficult for Pittsburghers to do, she said: Make new friends.

“So they can be comfortable interacting with people who are different from them,” Singleton said. “I challenge us all to make new friends.”

Aaron Aupperlee is a staff writer for Trib Total Media.

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