By: Tom Edmonds

Hello Brothers and Sisters,

Fall is here and leaves are falling. If you’re like me, the battle is on to stay ahead of those falling leaves. The morning air has a certain crispness to it to remind us that bow season is upon us. Deer are on the move, so please be safe during commutes to and from. It won’t be long and we’ll be using snow shovels and ice scrapers…burr.

I’d like to welcome two new brothers to the building – Dalton Gage (a machine repair transfer from Flint Engine), and new hire Cameron Kabat (tool maker). Welcome to the Plant 38 brotherhood.

The SAP was a hot topic at the recent Sub-council in Connecticut. The hit to the pension fund is the motivating factor for the late exit dates. It was made clear that any talks on this subject are over.

Our workload for the building continues to be “ho hum” (except the toolroom). Just enough work to do, but not enough to actually challenge the membership. Some of that is the ever-changing dates/scheduling of die programs out of our control.

I’d like to see us “busting at the seams” with work like years past, but the way die programs are picked these days appears to be like a roulette wheel. Budget and timing have management “afraid” to take a chance, I think. They won’t know what we are capable of until we have more than enough work sitting in front of us.

Until next month, have a Happy Halloween, and good luck to the deer hunters out there.