Alcoa curtails production
Submitted by jcht2010 on
Robert P. Chaney said he saw it coming, but maybe out of wishful thinking, he ignored it. The 17-year Alcoa employee said he’d been through layoffs before, so he knew what to look for, but didn’t think it would be as bad as it turned out to be.
In a press release dated Jan. 7, Alcoa Inc. announced the Point Comfort alumina operations would be curtailed by the end of the second quarter of 2016.
“We’ve been through this twice already,” he said, referring to layoffs. “I saw the signs and I guess I didn’t really want to see them, and then one day they said they were going to lay people off, and then they came back and said they were cutting to zero production.”
“Zero production” meant that almost all of the more than 700 employees at the Point Comfort Alcoa plant would soon be unemployed. Only a bare bones staff would remain to keep the facility maintained, leaving the plant on what amounts to life support. Chaney would not be one of those few employees kept on board.
He’s left with the question, “what now?” He doesn’t know the answer to that.
“In June it would be 18 years I’ve spent out there,” he said. “I don’t know what’s next. I am 46 years old. I gave them almost 20 years. I don’t want to go to anybody else, and I don’t even know if I can. Nobody wants to hire 46-year-old mechanics. They’re all looking for young people.”
As a union worker, Chaney has a little help from subsidy pay, which will help him limp along for the next two years, and he’s dabbled in taxidermy and welding in the past, but doesn’t know if he can make a career out of either.
“I haven’t done any welding in 18 years. I do some, but it isn’t like the rest of the world’s welding. It’s like junk welding. I don’t even know if I could pass a welding test if I went across the street [to Formosa].”
The halt in production comes at a time when other industries are already suffering. The price of oil is half of what it was two years ago, meaning oil workers are facing layoffs as well, leaving many blue collar workers without other options. Alcoa employees may, at any other time, turn to oil rigs for employment, but today that isn’t an option.
“It’s a bad deal,” said Chaney, “I am 46. Now I don’t even know how to start over. Maybe with the sub pay, and unemployment, and the taxidermy, I can pay my bills.”
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