WILMINGTON, Ohio (AP) - Business at The Rag Shop in this southwest Ohio city
has plummeted by more than half since a DHL announcement last week that
threatens at least 6,000 jobs at Wilmington Air Park.
Ellen Jones, a partner in the used furniture and collectibles store, said
the news has put a clamp on wallets and purses.
"People are scared," Jones said. "They're afraid to spend money."
And, she said, more people are calling asking that the store sell some of
their furniture.
Last week, DHL announced that it wants United Parcel Service to replace ABX
Air and ASTAR Air Cargo in transporting DHL packages. That would mean much of
the work normally handled in Wilmington would instead be transferred to UPS
facilities.
DHL owns the air park about 30 miles southeast of Dayton and hires ABX Air
to transport packages as well as unload, reload and sort them. ASTAR Air Cargo
also transports parcels for DHL. ABX employs 7,000 workers at the freight hub,
ASTAR 1,000 and DHL 720.
"This will be catastrophic for my organization," said Don Graber, president
of ABX Air.
DHL's announcement had an immediate bombshell impact on this city of 12,000
with its picturesque downtown and shaded side streets that front older
Victorian-style houses.
Chris Camp, who manages a filling station, estimates that air park employees
account for half of his business. He plans to look for a new job when he goes to
Alabama to visit his sister.
"It's going to make it into a ghost town, man," Camp said as he stood by the
pumps. "It's going to devastate three or four counties. It's starting to sink in
a little bit."
At least 45 Ohio counties have residents who work at ABX Air, according to
the company. Busloads of workers arrive daily from the Dayton, Cincinnati and
Columbus areas.
"But the folks who generally work there are from relatively small towns and
rural areas of southern Ohio," said Mark Dimondstein, lead field organizer for
the American Postal Workers Union who is helping lead a petition drive to
protest the DHL move.
Rev. Dean Feldmeyer, senior pastor at the Wilmington United Methodist
Church, has held prayer meetings over the DHL decision and said he expected
residents to be angrier.
"What I'm hearing is more despair," Feldmeyer said. "Businesses are going to
fail, homes are going to get foreclosed, cars are going to get repossessed."
The air park sprouted from the decommissioned Clinton County Air Force Base.
Airborne Freight Corp. (later Airborne Express) operated the park from 1980 to
2003, when it was purchased by DHL.
Pilots, sorters, loaders, mechanics, runway sweepers, grass cutters,
firemen, security guards, fuelers, health-clinic officials, administrators and
maintenance employees work at the 1,130-acre cargo hub. Its two runways handle
an estimated 150 planes a day.
Some residents and farmers work at the air park as a second job to make ends
meet. Others take jobs primarily to get health insurance.
Sorters make between $10 and $17 an hour. Much of the work is done at night,
when planes begin arriving at 11 p.m. and then depart beginning at 4:30 a.m.
The proposed arrangement with UPS is part of a U.S. restructuring by DHL
parent Deutsche Post. DHL's U.S. business has posted repeated losses and
slipping sales as it continues to lose market share to UPS and FedEx Corp.
"It's a decision that we had to make in order to improve our cost
structure," said DHL spokesman Jonathan Baker. "It was not a decision that was
made lightly."
DHL is hoping to complete the deal with UPS within three months. If a
contract is agreed to, the transfer of work at the air park will begin this year
and be completed by the end of 2009.
Lt. Gov. Lee Fisher said Friday that DHL's decision took the state by
surprise. He said officials are encouraging DHL to work with ABX Air to find
different ways to cut costs.
"Our first priority is to convince DHL not to go forward with their proposed
agreement with UPS," Fisher said.
Ohio's congressional delegation is asking the Justice Department to
investigate whether the proposal violates federal antitrust laws.
DHL's Baker said the company doesn't believe it would raise any antitrust
issues because it would simply involve a change of vendor services and DHL would
continue to aggressively compete against UPS. Baker said DHL would be open to
talks with ABX Air.
Fisher said that if the jobs are lost, the state will work to find
alternative uses of the air park and other opportunities for the workers.
Meanwhile, Camp said a proposal to open a $600 million casino and resort
nearby that would create 5,000 jobs has suddenly gotten new life among his
customers.
"They've said: 'I can't wait for the casino. This has got to come in now,'"
Camp said.
Thirty-one-year-old James Garner, who has lived in Wilmington his entire
life and worked at the air park for 15 years, fears he will lose his house if he
loses his job.
"It's not just me that will be destroyed by this," Garner said. "This town
will probably go away."
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