The newsletter for the Iowa worker.

It’s Wednesday, Mar. 20, 2024.

I’m still closely following the news that 1,276 Iowans will lose their jobs when the Tyson pork processing plant in Perry closes in June.

It will be the state’s largest plant closure in a decade, and have massive ripple effects for the town and surrounding area.

The Tyson pork processing plant in Perry, Iowa.

Photos by Pat Rynard/Starting Line

Roger Kail, president of the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 1155, represents workers at that plant.

He told me things had been going well in Perry. They had just signed their latest contract to supply product to a Japanese importing company, a successful partnership for several years. (Japan is the No. 2 export market for pork, behind Mexico, and one of the only growing markets.)

“We got that contract, but they still shut us down,” Kail said. “They’re going to give that contract to somebody else, which is terrible.”

Kail worried about longtime workers, especially those close to retirement.

“They feel like they got kind of screwed,” he said. “You buy a house and you’re in that town, you settle down, and now they probably have to sell their house. I’d hate to be a guy who is 59, 60, for real.”

The union and Tyson are negotiating this week on what the closure will look like, and what—if any—severance and re-employment assistance will be provided to workers.

“We feel the company’s kind of screwed them and the town,” Kail said. “I mean, how much compensation does the town or the state give Tyson for that plant?”

Iowa Workforce Development announced they would be sending their new mobile workforce center to Perry to help workers with services and finding jobs. Kail said UFCW is also giving workers information on other plants, including seven in Minnesota.

“They all pay pretty good; they’re pretty good jobs,” he said.

But what about if workers are looking to pivot to something new?

The construction industry desperately needs workers and are willing to train them, thanks to huge federal investments, said Central Iowa Building and Construction Trades Council Executive Director Samantha Groark.

“We are eager to work with the Perry community and UFCW union currently representing employees to help as many workers as possible transition into great careers in the building trades if they are interested and qualified,” she said.

Iowa Senate Democrats are proposing extending unemployment benefits for workers to 39 weeks, or what workers used to get for a plant closure before Republicans reduced it:

“About 20 years ago, Smithfield came in and bought out the Dubuque Packing Company and threw 2,000 workers out of work,” said Sen. Pam Jochum of Dubuque. “It took our community many, many years to recover from that plant closing.”
“We stand with Perry and the Iowans losing their jobs and their livelihoods because of Tyson’s decision,” said Sen. Sarah Trone Garriott of West Des Moines. “The effects of this closure will touch every corner of Dallas County—from schools to city services to Main Streets and beyond.”
“The difficulties facing Iowa workers and the community of Perry due to this plant closure are just beginning,” said Sen. Nate Boulton of Des Moines. “Tyson needs to own the consequences of its decision and make it right for the people of Perry – especially the workers who have shown years of dedication and loyalty to the plant.”
“The Tyson closure is a terrible loss … [which] will be even worse due to the cuts in unemployment aid and support for displaced workers forced onto our state by Gov. Kim Reynolds and the Republican legislature in recent years,” said Sen. Bill Dotzler of Waterloo. “Reductions in unemployment benefits and added red tape will add financial injury to the Perry workers facing this plant closure.”

I’d love to hear your reaction too.

Amie Rivers

Community Editor, Iowa Starting Line

Email me

This week’s Iowa worker news:

Taking tips from your workers=a no-no. Lu’s Deli in Cedar Rapids learned that the hard way when they were fined by the US Department of Labor and ordered to pay $14,000 in back wages and $14,000 in damages to 19 employees. The department found that, for at least two years, owner Laurie Konecny had been illegally including herself in the tip pool.
More than half of Iowa’s single parents don’t make enough. That’s one of the findings of a new report from Common Good Iowa on the state’s cost of living. Other not-great statistics: One in six of all Iowa workers doesn’t make enough income to live off of, along with 33% of Iowa’s Black and Latino families, and public support programs don’t make up the difference.
Disabled Iowans are educated and want to work, but without meaningful changes to income guidelines in a program that helps them pay for home health care, they can’t.
150 workers at John Deere in Ankeny will be laid off for two months, in April and May.
A hospice worker quit after being told to let patients die: Alisha Ebert of Janesville, who had been working for Compassus in Cedar Falls, was awarded unemployment benefits by a judge, who said: “Ms. Ebert should not have to work in an environment where her manager at a job providing care for people in hospice would tell Ms. Ebert to essentially let people die instead of providing them with care.”
21-year-old dies in trench collapse: Jacob Young of Dubuque died while constructing an apartment building for SMITH DIRT WRX of Peosta.
It’s Girl Scout cookie time, and while the Scouts themselves are not unionized, the cookie bakers are.
Back at the bargaining table after 10 months: The Union of Grinnell Student Dining Workers and Grinnell College were back at the bargaining table as of late last month.
Working on unionizing: Nine employees at Plant Site Logistics in Dubuque voted yesterday on whether to join up with the UAW, while 11 laborers at Allied Construction Services in Des Moines will vote March 27 on whether to be covered by the Laborers Local 177.