By
Sam Killian
Staff Writer
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group of General Motors retirees talk about the future
of the company at the Riverside Family Restaurant
Wednesday. GM announced last week that production
at its Janesville plant will be reduced from two
shifts to one in July. Officials expect about 750
workers to be affected. |
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JANESVILLE — Chris Albrecht worked in the insurance industry
for five years before taking a job on the assembly line
at the Janesville General Motors plant in 1995.
The 37-year-old Janesville woman now wonders if she’ll
have to put her past experience to work once again. General
Motors announced Monday that, in the wake of declining
sales and skyrocketing gas prices, the company in July
will cut production at the local plant from two shifts
to one.
“I have a lot of things going through my head because
I really don’t know if I have a job or not,” Albrecht said.
“I’m just kind of in a daze about it.”
Local GM spokeswoman Mary Fanning said the company has
informed the state that roughly 750 workers could be affected
by the decision, but that figure “is a pretty fluid number.”
The facility currently employs about 2,600 hourly workers
and 195 salaried employees.
The Janesville plant, which builds the Chevrolet Tahoe
and Suburban and the GMC Yukon and Yukon XL, was one of
four GM facilities faced with shift layoffs. The others
— in Pontiac and Flint, Mich., and Oshawa, Ontario — build
pickup trucks. The other two plants that build full-size
SUVs — in Arlington, Texas and Silao, Mexico — still will
operate two shifts.
Fanning said once production is reduced to a single shift,
workers would build 58 trucks per hour, up from 44 per
hour now.
UAW 95 President Mike Sheridan said the output increase
means more people will keep their jobs.
“I think the number will be significantly less than 750,”
he said. “They’ll need more people for the shift … and
that will put a dent into that final number.”
The number of layoffs also will depend on the number of
employees who accept GM’s latest buyout offer. Employees
have until May 22 to decide whether to accept buyout, retirement
or early retirement offers. The value of those packages
varies based on seniority; Sheridan said about 250 people
already have signed up.
Albrecht hadn’t considered taking the buyout before Monday’s
announcement, but might change her mind if she learned
she was being considered for a layoff. For now, she’s more
concerned about the long-term implications for the Janesville
plant and its parent company, which last week posted a
$3.3 billion first-quarter loss.
“It takes a lot to make cuts like this,” Albrecht said.
“If they’re going to implement this, it’s going to last
for a while.”
Fallout from the announced layoffs will extend further
than GM. Employees at Lear Corp., LSI and Allied Automotive
— all parts-suppliers to the Janesville facility — also
will be affected.
“It’s just going to have a devastating impact. I’m concerned
ultimately for these people, where they’ll find jobs, whether
they’ll be able to keep their homes,” said Mike Vaughn,
UAW Local 95 shop chairman at Lear, which supplies GM with
seats and other interior products. “I can only hope that
the economy will rebound and gas prices will level, and
at some point in time we can get some help from our federal
government.”
Although disappointed with the announcement, Sheridan
said the union will do everything in its power to ensure
the success of the Janesville plant, which is the oldest
GM facility in the country.
“We need to make sure we’re pulling out all the stops,”
he said. “I think there’s a possibility of us making another
visit to Detroit to express that Janesville is in this
for the long haul.”
Auto-industry analysts have mixed forecasts for the future
of large vehicles.
“We’ve never seen gas prices at this level, and they don’t
show signs of coming down,” said Michelle Krebs, senior
industry editor for Edmunds AutoObserver, an online forecasting
firm. “I don’t think anything is going to change for the
better in those segments throughout the rest of the year,
and I think that’s the signal GM sent this week.”
Greg Gardner, a spokesman for Oliver Wyman — which publishes
the Harbour Report on auto manufacturing — is cautiously
optimistic.
“If gasoline prices stay where they are or go higher for
the next 12 months, then any one of these plants could
be vulnerable to closing,” he said. “But there’s an argument
to be made that prices are close to a peak and could come
down, so it could go either way.”
Fanning stressed that market demand was the sole reason
for the cutbacks. Gardner said based on plant performance,
the cuts aren’t a reflection on the Janesville work force.
However, those reasons do little to reassure families
facing unemployment.
“We’re scared and shocked,” said Janesville resident Fania
Casper, whose husband, Brent, works at the plant. “We don’t
really know what’s going on.”
John Berkley, a financial adviser with SSI Investments
and former GM employee, sympathizes with the workers faced
with the decision of staying with the company or taking
a buyout.
Berkley was offered two buyout opportunities during his
time with GM; one in 1983 and another in 1993.
“I know the pain, and I know the sleepless nights,” he
said. “This news is going to make this an issue for people
who may not have considered (the buyout) before.”
Sheridan believes the quality of the local work force
gives employees something to look forward to.
“We have a work force that is second to none, and that’s
the reason they continue to produce vehicles here in Janesville,”
he said. “And that’s the reason I think we’re going to
be building vehicles here long into the future.”
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