Advertisement
Parent company Slinger Manufacturing Co. of Slinger, Wis., notified the Sparta plant’s employees last week, citing competition from China and India.
The Sparta plant has about 55 hourly production employees who are represented by Laborers Local 140, said Kevin Lee, business manager for the La Crosse-based union local. “We knew things were going downhill,” Lee said Thursday. “It was a little surprising that (the plant closing) was this early.”
The Sparta plant makes cast-iron cylinder sleeves for automobile and small engines. It has made other products in the past and at one time had as many as 200 employees. Brothers Maurice and William Holtan established Sparta Manufacturing in 1957, according to Tribune files.
Slinger Manufacturing President Steve Holtan didn’t return Tribune telephone calls Wednesday or Thursday.
Sparta Mayor John Gomez said he wasn’t surprised by the plant shutdown announcement. “I know that with the foreign competition in the last few years, competing has been tough” for the plant, he said.
Gomez said he is optimistic about the chances of Sparta Manufacturing employees finding jobs at other manufacturers. “We’ve been kind of fortunate to have new industry come in,” he said, noting that Multistack Inc. recently moved to Sparta from West Salem, Wis., and that Mathews Inc. in Sparta has been expanding.
But Lee, noting many manufacturing jobs have moved overseas, said “I don’t think finding a new job will be all that easy, especially one that has benefits.”
Lee said Sparta Manufactur-ing officials have been talking about competition from low-wage producers in China and India for a couple of years. “The quality (of products made in those countries) isn’t even close to what ours is,” he said. “But it’s the price.”
Holtan indicated the Sparta property eventually will be put up for sale, Lee said, but he wasn’t optimistic someone will buy and reopen it as a foundry.
He predicted the union and company will work together to get federal Trade Adjustment Act assistance, which is for workers who lose their jobs because of foreign competition. In the past several years, TAA assistance has been available to laid-off employees of Trane Co., Stroh Brewery Co., LaCrosse Footwear Inc., ALTEC International and Isola Laminate Systems.
Steve Cahalan can be reached at (608) 791-8229 or scahalan@lacrossetribune.com.
