The Militant(logo) 
    Vol.60/No.19           May 13, 1996 
 
 
Iowa Packinghouse Closes, Laying Off 1,300  

BY BARBARA BOWMAN
DES MOINES, Iowa-With a posted notice on the bulletin board near the time clocks, the Monfort Co. abruptly announced "a suspension of operations" at its Des Moines meatpacking plant here. The notice was posted on April 11, the day before the company shut down the plant. The company claims that it is losing money at Des Moines's largest manufacturing facility, where 1,300 workers are employed. The plant worked six days a week for most of last year. In recent weeks workers have often been sent home after 32 hours.

"Margins in the beef processing industry are very narrow, and the Des Moines plant is our least productive facility. We are losing a lot of money at the plant, so we've made the difficult decision to suspend operations, while we consider the plant's future," Monfort president Kevin LaFleur claimed in the notice posted in the plant.

Many workers at the beef plant are fairly recent immigrants from Mexico, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Laos, Vietnam, Thailand, Cambodia, the Sudan, and other countries.

City and state officials are scrambling to try to keep Monfort in operation. Des Moines mayor Arthur Davis is leading a delegation to Monfort's headquarters in Greeley, Colorado. In similar situations in this state in recent years, packinghouse bosses and other manufacturers have been given huge payments from the state to build new plants or to refurbish old ones. These payments have been accompanied by a demand for the unions to grant substantial concessions.

Workers at the plant gate commented on the impending shutdown. "They may be trying to change the name and reopen going with lower pay and no union," said Rich Bonwell, a United Food and Commercial Workers union member who has worked at the plant for more than 11 years. "After all that overtime we worked, it's hard to believe this place is losing money."

"They may be trying to tear up that contract we just signed," added Shelby who has worked at Monfort for eight years.

"For weeks we've been working on installing a new system for boxing," said Jack a worker in packaging, "and now it has a `for sale' sign on it."

Diane, who was leaving her clean-up job, remarked, "I'm no spring chicken, I don't know what I am going to do now."

"They are trying to get the city to do what Monfort wants it to do," said Sheila, a United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) inspector. She was referring to the fact that Monfort is unable to dispose of the voluminous animal fat generated in the slaughtering operation and fabrication operation and has been making large payments to the city to get rid of the fat through the Des Moines waste water system.

In addition to the workers, small cattle farmers will also be hit hard by the closing, as a quarter of the cows raised in Iowa are slaughtered at this plant.

"It hits us in the stomach. We're just sick here," said Mark Williams spokesman for the Iowa Cattlemen's Association. "If the plant stays dark for any significant amount of time, it would be devastating to Iowa's cattle industry."

Barbara Bowman is a former member of United Food and Commercial Workers Union Local 431 at the Des Moines Monfort plant.  
 
 
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