UAW members rally against plant closure

By K.O. Jackson

FENTON, Mo. — What happens at one Chrysler Group LLC plant affects all Chrysler plants.

The same is true with Chrysler’s United Auto Workers’ members.

When a plant is shuttered and a UAW worker is hurting, members respond to the call — even if the call is a six-hour drive away from Chrysler’s Kokomo facilities.

Early Friday morning, a bus half-filled with Kokomo Chrysler UAW retirees and current employees left UAW 685 union hall’s parking lot en route to Fenton, Mo., a suburb of St. Louis.

There they were greeted by yellow signs reading “Gate Closed” on fences surrounding the sprawling Fenton Chrysler North and South Assembly plants.

So were the two plants once producing the Dodge Ram pickup and the Chrysler minivan.

The plants once employed more than 6,000 workers. The last Ram left the north plant July 2. The south plant’s last minivan exited the facility in November 2008.

All that remains are weeds sprouting through concrete cracks in empty parking lots.

Since emerging from bankruptcy, with assistance from Fiat SpA and a $12-billion U.S. government bailout package, Chrysler has announced it will sell the shuttered Missouri plants and build the minivan in Windsor, Canada, and the Ram in Saltillo, Mexico.

However, before the closure is completely consummated, the Show-Me-State wanted to show Chrysler the company can’t leave Missouri without a fight.

Wearing blue UAW shirts emblazoned with the message “Stop Plant Closings In the USA,” more than 3,500 people protested the Fenton closures on the plants’ front yards Friday in a “Rally for Americans” protest.

It is the first Chrysler plant protest — but not the last — since America’s smallest automaker exited its brief bankruptcy stay June 10.

With Fiat, Chrysler Group LLC is now the world’s sixth-largest automaker.

“We have heard the government plans to retain the 30,000 unemployed workers affected by the Chrysler plants closing here. We have heard from Chrysler that they will handle the plant closures and job losses in a socially responsible manner,” said Don Ackermann, president of UAW Local 136, whose north assembly plant was affected by the closing.

Ackermann was one of many union members, Teamsters officials and politicians who addressed the audience about America’s manufacturing-labor issues with other countries.

They spoke of Chrysler plans to close eight U.S. plants, but none in Mexico or Canada. They addressed the fact from 2004 through July 2008, more than 1,6 million Chrysler vehicles were sold in the U.S. versus around a quarter-million in Canada.

“Build them where you sell them,” continued Ackermann. “[Politicians] must get it through their head they are destroying the American way of life. We need to send a strong message to them that enough is enough.

“The plant closures affect everyone from the workers and their families to the school districts to charitable organizations. This is no longer a business issue, but a social issue. The corporations failed and they had to borrow from the U.S. taxpayers. Now they want to carry U.S. taxpayers’ money across the borders. Enough is enough.”

When Rich Boruff, president of UAW 685, addressed the audience, he said, “I couldn’t be prouder to stand here in front of you. This is a fighting town. It breaks my heart to see what is happening here.”

Boruff expects the next protest rally will be held in September at the Michigan Sterling Heights Assembly plant where the Chrysler Sebring and Dodge Avenger are built.

That facility is scheduled to close in 2010.

Boruff and Jeff Everett, president of UAW Local 1166, said they both expect future protests to grow bigger.

“We will fight this every step of the way,” Everett said. “We don’t need a handout or rebate or a stimulus check. What we need is a job and the place to start is right here.”

The idea of Chrysler jobs crossing the U.S. border may be around for a while. With the merger, Fiat plans to build its highly fuel efficient Fiat 500 mini car in Toluca, Mexico.

The company plans to introduce the car in North America in two years and estimates it will sell 50,000.

Shawn Fain, a member of the UAW/Chrysler National Negotiation Committee, said they cannot fight what the company plans to sell, but they can “mobilize” to voice their concern.

And that concern, that fight starts in Kokomo, he adds.

“It is exciting to see the turnout, but we have to step this up to a national level and it starts at a local level,” said Fain, who meets monthly with the national committee discussing what is occurring in Chrysler’s plants.

“It’s good to see the concern, but we have 5,000 members and [Kokomo] couldn’t fill a 55-passenger bus for a free ride to protest a closing. If we are not going to fight now, who is going to fight for us in Kokomo? It’s too late when [the local plants] are closing. We have to mobilize now.”

Fighting, protesting and having a place to work are reasons Leslie W. Ellison and his wife, Kerry, rode the bus from Kokomo to Fenton.

Leslie, a Howard County councilman, retired from Kokomo Transmission Plant with 22 1/2 years of service. Kerry is employed at Indiana Transmission Plant 2.

There is a connection between Kokomo and Fenton, Leslie said. Some of Fenton’s workers have worked in Kokomo and Kokomo workers have worked in Fenton.

“I couldn’t help but to think by the grace of God goes Kokomo,” said Leslie. “This could have been Kokomo, luckily Fiat liked our product enough to keep us. This [protest] was a tremendous experience.”

Along with Kerry Ellison, Charlene Alexander was one of a few current Chrysler employees making the charter-bus trip.

Three years away from retirement from KTP, Alexander called her retired friend Dana Wilson and reminded her about the protest rally trip.

The two shared laughs and thoughts throughout the trip.

“It’s a shame they didn’t do something before the plant closed. When the plant’s doors close, it’s no way to open them back up,” said Alexander. “We need to know what is going on in our plants so we can keep our doors open so the same thing doesn’t happen to us in Kokomo.”

“We need to get the buses full next time,” said Wilson. “Let everybody know and open it up to everybody so we can make it bigger in Michigan.”

• K.O. Jackson is the Tribune’s business writer. He can be reached at (765) 854-6739 or via e-mail kirven.jackson@kokomotribune.com

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