Commentary: Open Forum

Winchester Star
September 21, 2006

Misleading – O-N’s claims are unfair to employees

Bringing job security into question for O-N’s Middletown employees has led some to believe jobs are in jeopardy. However, the company is attempting to mislead Star readers as they have done to their own employees.

In a Sept. 16 Star article, plant manager Spencer Stinson stated that the company “does not have a contingency plan for its workers” if the rezoning request for 639 acres of rural lands is denied. This statement, as well as the simple fact that employees are clearly not being reassured that their jobs will be safe for quite a long time, is borderline employee mistreatment.

Mining at the Middletown quarry has been occurring for decades. During that time, no fewer than five different companies have owned that property. Mining will continue there for decades to come, even if another company takes ownership. If not O-N, another company will emerge. Current employees will continue working; they’ll just be working for different owners as has happened many times in the past.

Why would O-N be misleading their own employees and telling them their jobs are in jeopardy? It’s because the company is in somewhat of a “pickle” and they’re digging for something that make this egregious application more palatable.

They know that the Board of Supervisors cannot follow the county’s Comprehensive Plan and approve this request to rezone the Middletown property. This is a basic land use issue. Employees find themselves caught up in the middle of a fight between the county and a large, out-of-state corporation trying to capitalize on a rezoning that is unlikely to gain approval.

The real issue employees face is what O-N’s corporate executives in Cleveland decide to do with the land if it were to be rezoned. Why would a company, that’s currently liquidating so many assets and emerging from a period of financial instability, go after such a large amount of acreage at one time, rather than attempting to expand little by little as they need more product to extract. It is highly unlikely that a rezoning application like this would ever have been submitted if not for the fact that the Frederick County Sanitation Authority is paying all costs for the rezoning in order to obtain an unproven source of water.

O-N has quarries in Clearbrook, Middletown and Strasburg. There are more than 600 local acres zoned for extractive manufacturing in Clearbrook in addition to the quarries O-N wishes to reopen in Strasburg. There is rock. These hard-working people will be able to mine, process, and haul rock, regardless of whether this application is approved or not.

History shows that, while many companies preceded O-N, employees of its predecessors still remain. Employees of O-N will remain long after O-N becomes a predecessor itself. O-N needs to be responsible and stop spreading this kind of fear. It’s not fair to make hard-working employees loose sleep over false claims. Employees shouldn’t be the pawns used to gain unwarranted sympathy for a corporation who submitted a ridiculous rezoning application.

Jeff Carter is a resident of Middletown