not to say It is very easy to where in Lordstown, the community stops and where the car factory will begin. You will notice the tapestry that hangs in the office of mayor Arno Hill. All car are depicted on the models, the General Motors over the decades, the factory has built. Pontiac Firebird, Chevrolet the Cavalier, Chevrolet Cobalt, since 2011: Chevrolet Cruze. This car is what the mayor means when he says: “We make a great product.” “We” are the residents and the factory workers, the “we” is the company, with all the identify. On the factory site on the outskirts of the community erected a sign that says: “Lordstown congratulates General Motors to the success of the Cruze.”
The Cruze is a compact sedan with a notchback, and a success he is for some time. The Americans prefer to buy large SUV’s and Pick-up Trucks, the price of gasoline is low. Not once in Lord town you see a lot of people driving a Cruze. The model would not be produced forever, here was clear to all. Dave Green (48). He stood for the first time in 30 years on the Assembly line of Lordstown. Today, he is Chairman of the local section of the United Auto Workers, the trade Union of car industry. In his office in the trade unions locally to the factory Green, red sweater, crew cut, goatee, looking at the old calendar on the wall “In January 2018 you painted the first layer, 1500 workers. In April 2018, the second, once again 1500 people.”
mayor Arno Hill (l.) and trade unionists Dave Green. Photos: Alan Cassidy
But what was eventually done a few weeks ago, didn’t expect Green. 26. In November, the group announced the leadership of General Motors, they stopped the car production in Lordstown and in two other works complete. The future of the remaining 1500 employees: open. Green the Information received is a quarter of an hour in advance. “After that, I moved through the hall and comforted the people. I saw many white faces, some looked as if they would tip over. Some wept.”
In the language regime of General Motors closed the plant, but merely “unallocated”, not assigned. What this means, it knows no one here. “As a company lawyer has received a lot of money to come to this concept,” says Green. He laughs briefly, it is a bitter Laugh. What is clear is that in March of last Cruze from the conveyor belt will run. Then General Motors in Lordstown, either another vehicle model building or the work is definitely shut down. Already 300 of the remaining 1500 employees have accepted jobs in other factories of the group.
The end of a large family
the factory Closes for good, it would be the end of a long history, on the rest of the corner in northeast Ohio are all proud of. 53 years cars have been made in 53 years, the factory was the center of economic life in the village and in the surroundings, for 53 years, she created the feeling of a community: “General Motors Lordstown,” says Green, “this is like a family.” And this is supposed to be over? Almost any of the nearly 4000 inhabitants, has a connection to General Motors, either because he or she works in the factory or in one of the factories that manufacture for example, the seats for the cars.
This also applies for the mayor. Arno Hill (66) used to be a toolmaker at General-Motors subsidiary company. Now the brawny Republican sits in his office in a chair made of artificial leather, in addition to the wall carpet with the cars and the stars and stripes in the corner. Hill-wracking weeks. “40 percent of our tax revenues come from General Motors. This way to fall now,” he says. In 2019, it will come clear. “We have established reserves that we are debt-free.” But how to do it next year? “We don’t know it.”
What is threatening in Lordstown, have other places in America’s rust, made by a belt a long time ago. The announcement by General Motors from the 26. November, a Monday, reminded many of a other Assembly in the autumn of 1977, as in neighboring Youngstown, the largest steel factory sealed. All of us here know the date as “Black Monday”. Thereafter, a steel mill disappeared after the other, thousands of Jobs were lost. Just the plant of General Motors in Lordstown made for a bit of security – the greater the disappointment. “The people feel that General Motors betrayed,” says Hill, “and I can understand that.”
However, in Lordstown, you do not want to accept the decline. You want to fight. Because in addition to the anger of hope, as Hill says. The hope is that the group choose, in Lordstown, a different car model. One of the two SUV’s that General Motors is today in South Korea build. Or one of the electric models are planned for the coming years.
students wrote letters to the CEO of GM
to produce p> public pressure on General Motors, the municipality, the trade Union and the local chamber of Commerce and an image campaign was launched. It’s called “Drive It Home”. The message: don’t Give up the work, don’t give up to Lord’s town. “The workers here can build any car,” says a trade unionist Green. The factory had been modernized only a few years ago. On the other, there is no community that identifies so much with a company like the people in Lord’s town. “If we can do the bosses in Detroit, clearly, we have a Chance.”
the campaign is Supported by the deputies of the state of Ohio in Congress. “From both parties,” stresses Green, is himself a Democrat, “when will there be today?” The campaign is supported but mainly by the inhabitants of Lordstown. Recently, students wrote letters to Mary Barra, CEO of General Motors. Some of them hang in the trade unions locally. “Dear Mary,” it says in the letter to a high school student, “my mother has been working for 27 years in the factory. Now my parents decide to put their life on the head and move away.” Another student wrote to Barra: “imagine, how many lives destroyed and how many families are torn apart.”
All the broken promises
Green leads now through the Assembly room of trade Union premises, a fridge with beer in a corner, a podium with Baseball trophies, the works team in the other, and on the wall a picture of Barack Obama showing him with workers in Lordstown. The President visited the factory in the fall of 2009, after the U.S. government, General Motors was saved from bankruptcy. Shortly thereafter, the group received one of the many other tax discounts. “They gave us at the time, the promise of the Lord’s town for at least 30 years to operate,” says Green. “We remember you now.”
Even Donald Trump made the inhabitants of the area, a promise. “Not sold your houses and moved away!”, the President in 2017, said in front of supporters in Youngstown. “The factory jobs will all return.” Is received to the contrary, and Green is not sure that Trump 2020 is to succeed, what he managed to 2016: to get in this district, the elect, traditionally, democratically, once again, the majority of the votes. “If he comes here next Time, and we do not build cars any more, people have a different opinion of him.”
just
mayor Hill, who chose the Trump, wait, that looks a little different. “The President has too much on the plate, as he could take care of everything,” he says. For his work, he would give Trump a good Note: “Elsewhere, the economy is growing, we stop always takes a little longer.” But he very much hope that Trump beginning for the future of the plant in Lordstown. As the group made its announcement that it had Trump threatened the Management to withdraw tax credits. However, since then, have you heard in Lordstown nothing more from the President.
just Green and Hill don’t want to wait. Last week they traveled to the auto show in Detroit, where they met with representatives of General Motors. Also the Governor of Ohio, campaigned there, the group head of Barra, in Lordstown, a new car, and offered the support of the Federal state. A commitment was Barra. Before you decide whether to forgive a new model to Lordstown, it is necessary to increase the capacity utilisation at other manufacturing locations in the United States, she said in front of journalists.
there is hope
also, many residents do not want to Wait. “You can’t afford,” says Amanda Mazurkiewicz (38), who works in one of the three Restaurants in the village, a friendly Diner, where the coffee is thin and the Serving of the Breakfast menus is huge. “Many of my friends are moving away.” The value of the houses had already fallen. “And we are afraid that the school will no longer have any more money, if the tax revenues of General Motors are there.”
The lack of customers, the Restaurants and the few shops in the resort. “SHOP LOCAL” demanded Hill in the Bulletin of the congregation of his fellow citizens. “Support the stores! Let’s not a Ghost town.” If the leaves still turn away? In Lord town, you hope. But it is no longer in your Hand. (Editorial Tamedia)
Created: 23.01.2019, 19:17 PM