Gunite Corporation expected to live up to promise of downsizing

Elkhart, IN - Between 200 and 300 people will be out of work after the holidays, if a Michiana manufacturer makes good on a promise to cut its workforce.

Gunite Corporation will layoff as many as 250 employees in the first quarter of 2007, and could do away with another 150 later in the year.

More manufacturing jobs will be lost in Elkhart, if the trucking business takes a predicted turn for the worse in 2007.

Gunite Corporation announced this week it will cut its workforce in half at Plant One, leaving as many as 300 people without a job.

The company makes brake systems for heavy trucks and has been part of the Elkhart community since the late 1980's.

Jim Szucs of the Teamsters Local 364 said, “The average rate of pay in the plant is $15 an hour. The benefits include no cost sharing for major medical coverage. It would be tough to find a job in this area that would match the pay and benefits that these employees receive.”

Teamster’s Local 364 represent most of Gunite's employees.

They are negotiating incentives for those who plan to stay and work up until the layoffs.

The trucking industry expects to take a hit in 2007 because that's when the Environmental Protection Agency will begin enforcing stricter standards for truck emissions.

When producing the trucks begins to cost more, Gunite expects to sell less. which is why they will need fewer employees, according to their parent company, Acquired Corporation.

“Customers have demanded higher tolerance hubs in volumes that can not be satisfied at the existing Plant One. Our competitors, both in the U.S. and abroad are manufacturing and selling products for significantly lower costs than that which can be produced in the current Elkhart facility,” Szucs said.

Work done at Gunite Plant One will be subcontracted to a company in Rockford, Illinois, leaving part of an Elkhart workforce that has decades of seniority, out on the street.

Employees at Gunite are focusing on keeping there jobs in the short term, which is why the workers NewsCenter 16 spoke to were reluctant to go on camera.