By Eric Stock
NORMAL – Local economic developers plan to establish a task force to come up with ways to find a new buyer to take over the Mitsubishi Motors plant which plans to stop production later this year and to find career training for nearly 1,300 displaced workers.
“The focus right now is on employees,” said Mike O’Grady, Vice President of the Bloomington-Normal Economic Development Council. “Some of this can be going on simultaneously, but I think we need to find out where we are headed with this before we start worrying about what kind of incentive (to give a potential employer).”
PODCAST: Listen to Scott and Colleen’s interviews with Renner, Koos and O’Grady.
O’Grady told WJBC’s Scott Laughlin Mitsubishi has been given a generous but not out-of-the-ordinary package of tax incentives to stay in Normal.
O’Grady said if another car maker wants to take over the site, they would be wise to use union labor. Mitsubishi has said labor costs were not a factor in its decision to close, even though its the only Japanese automaker that used union labor in the U.S.
“This difficult decision follows years of challenge to remain viable, and was compelled by the combination of insufficient U.S. sales and low production capacity utilization,” said Hiroshi Harunari, executive vice president in charge of overseas operations for Mitsubishi Motors Corporation. “We greatly value the work of all of our employees in Normal and want to stress that our motivation to exit from this facility is unrelated to labor costs or our relationship with the UAW.”
The Bloomington-Normal mayors say it won’t be easy to replace the jobs that will be lost when Mitsubishi Motors halts production.
Bloomington mayor Tari Renner said there’s been talk of a potential employer at the site, but it’s just talk so far.
“People in the know have suggested there are possibilities, no matter what though, it will be very difficult,” Renner said.
Normal mayor Chris Koos said the plant, valued at about $4 million, shouldn’t go to waste.
“We have a valuable asset in the community,” Koos said. “That plant is one of the most technologically-advanced plants in the world still. So it’s not like there’s not interest in that facility.”
Mitsubishi Motors announced on Friday that it plans to stop production in November. Mitsubishi is the sixth largest employer in McLean County with about 1,280 workers. Koos noted about half of those live in Bloomington-Normal.
Eric Stock can be reached at [email protected].
