December 29, 2013
It was, in so many ways, the sort of year we've come to expect at GE Transportation.
Erie's biggest employer named a new chief executive, posted record profits, invested millions in buildings and technology, rolled out new pollution-cutting technology and tested locomotives powered by the natural gas that could be the fuel of the future.
But Erie won't likely remember 2013 for any of that.
Instead, it will likely be remembered as the year the company put its foot down, telling union workers that costs were too high and production was too low.
It was the year that the company leveraged the power of an alternate manufacturing site in Texas, announcing plans in April to eliminate 1,050 Erie jobs, including 950 union positions.
Provisions of the union's collective bargaining agreement with the company set up one of the summer's most notable moments of high drama. Union workers had a 60-day window to reach a compromise with the company that could reduce the number of lost jobs.
More than 25 negotiating sessions would end with a midnight deadline, complete with 11th-hour proposals and counterproposals.
But it would also end without success.
It is a matter of perspective if one side or the other failed or was shortsighted. Some in Erie's business community believe the union foolishly passed on an opportunity to save jobs.
Others, including Scott Duke, president of Local 506 of the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers at GE Transportation, didn't see much to like in a company plan that would have created a two-scale wage structure.
What was wrong with the company's proposal? Duke was asked in June.
"It wasn't one thing. It was everything," he said.
Feelings run strong on this issue.
Writers of letters to the editor wondered why the union didn't take concessions that would have saved jobs.
The answer to that question seemed clear to many of the union members who have reached out to the Erie Times-News.
"This was a way to divide us, to lower our wages," one longtime employee said.
Jim Kurre, professor of economics at Penn State Behrend, didn't assign blame to one side or the other during a recent speaking engagement.
But as an economist who studies the community and as a person who lives here, he's left with a visceral reaction to what the loss of so many jobs might mean.
"I'm just sorry they couldn't settle that," he said. "It's very sad."
GE has cut jobs before, sometimes hundreds of jobs at a time.
The elimination of 1,400 jobs in 2009 delivered a painful blow to the community. But it was a community that understood the cuts might just be temporary.
The locomotive business, after all, is known for its highs and lows.
Sure enough, when business picked up after the 2009 cuts, employment at the Lawrence Park Township plant came roaring back.
But the company doesn't blame a lack of work for recent layoffs.
Company officials are calling it a transfer of work.
For the first time, GE Transportation has a lower-cost option for building locomotives and other equipment at its new plant in Fort Worth, Texas.
That makes this time different.
And that makes this time more troubling, Erie Mayor Joe Sinnott said.
"It's moving a production line out of Erie and into an alternate plant in Texas," Sinnott said. "I think it's a different move and one that we hope doesn't become the trend of the company."
Sinnott said the company has assured him the business of making locomotive kits will remain in Erie.
He hopes so, and hopes that this transfer of work won't be followed by additional waves.
"It's a very important thing for the community," he said. "And it has a lasting impact."
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