Alcoa plans to cut 390 jobs in Wenatchee

PITTSBURGH — Alcoa Inc. will cut nearly 400 jobs and not reopen its Wenatchee aluminum smelter due to a labor impasse, the company said Monday.

Alcoa will record a pretax charge of $20 million in the third quarter to pay for the layoffs, the company said.

Wenatchee Works in central Washington was idled in July 2001 when aluminum prices fell and the cost of energy skyrocketed. With wholesale aluminum prices up more than 20 percent in the past year, the company had sought to reopen the plant but demanded concessions from workers.

In a news release, the company said the plant’s 390 hourly and salaried workers have been told their last day of work will be on or about Oct. 1. They will continue to earn their full salaries until then.

The smelter’s employees have stayed on the payroll since the plant’s shutdown in part due to an agreement with the Chelan County Public Utilities District to market Alcoa’s 23 percent share of unused power generated at Rocky Reach Dam on the Columbia River. Alcoa has received about $76.7 million since the agreement took effect July 1, 2001.

A 2001 agreement with the Bonneville Power Administration, another electricity supplier to Alcoa, paid Alcoa $350 million for its unused power, The Wenatchee World reported Monday.

Workers have refused to make the concessions sought by the company, including a contribution to health care plans that amounted to an average of $72 per month, Alcoa officials said.

Workers should not be asked to make concessions when the company is turning large profits, said Andrew Palm, chairman of negotiating panel for the United Steelworkers of America. Alcoa earlier this month reported net profits for the second quarter were up 87 percent.

The Wenatchee smelter has a capacity of 182,000 metric tons per year.