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Brownfields, Cleanups and Anti-Union Cranks; Carl Davidson; Keep On Keepin’ On; December 27, 2013.
This piece also appeared on the USW website.
You can learn more about BCR’s leftster management here. “Leftster” is the combination of leftist and gangster, inspired by the left-originated “bankster.”
Here’s a thumbnail version of LTV/J&L Aliquippa history during the time period relevant to this discussion. I pieced this together from various news sources, some of which differed slightly on timing, so please forgive me for any minor errors. If you find any errors, please let me know.
Ling-Temco-Vought (LTV), a Texas-based conglomerate, bought controlling interest in Jones and Laughlin Steel (J&L) in 1968 and gained full control in 1974. During the late-1970s/early-1980s, J&L acquired and/or merged with Youngstown Sheet & Tube (1978) and Republic Steel (Cleveland, 1984). The U.S. Justice Department required LTV to sell two of Republic’s sheet steel operations as part of the merger. J&L bought a stainless-steel mill from McLouth Steel (Detroit) in 1981. After the 1978 merger, LTV’s steel division was renamed J&L Steel. After the Republic merger, the division was renamed LTV Steel.
LTV Steel shut down the bulk of the Aliquippa Works in 1984/1985. LTV Corporation (LTV Steel’s parent) entered Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 1986 remained there until 1993. The 14-inch and tin mills kept running or were restarted after the 1986-1993 bankruptcy. LTV Steel kept the tin mill and continued to operate it until U.S. Steel (USS) bought the company’s tin mill business (announced in 2000, completed in 2001) and shut down the Aliquippa tin mill in 2001 as part of the deal.
During the 1986-1993 bankruptcy, some investors formed J&L Structural (JLS) to purchase and operate the 14-inch mill. Locals may remember it was JLS that refurbished the previously-abandoned Aliquippa train station for its offices. Unfortunately, JLS filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2000. In 2002, the JLS primary creditor - Congress Financial - auctioned off the remaining assets. The 14-inch mill was the last operating department at the Aliquippa Works.
Ultimately, local real estate developer Chuck Betters bought the bulk of the former Aliquippa Works property (included buildings, land, and some equipment) in 1993/1994 for redevelopment. After the 14-inch and tin mills were shut down in 2001/2002, Mr. Betters acquired that property. In 1998, U.S. Gypsum bought 120 acres and built a wallboard manufacturing plant on the property. Also in 1998, Beaver County bought 20 acres for a new jail. Most of the redevelopment of the remaining property has been to demolish buildings, sell the scrap, and install infrastructure to make the site more attractive for potential buyers. This property was one of the sites considered by Shell for an ethane cracking plant before settling on the Horsehead site down the river in Potter Township.
Some people claim LTV made little or no investments in the Aliquippa Works. From what I can tell, that claim is false.
Below is a critique of the subject piece.
“My home town of Aliquippa once hosted one of the largest steel mills in the world. Now, after the shutdowns and job exporting of the 1980s, it has one of the largest ‘brownfields’ in the world. That’s seven miles of highly polluted empty land along the Ohio, It’s hard even for weeds to grow there.”
[RWC] Based on his own writing, Aliquippa has never been Mr. Davidson’s “home town.” Mr. Davidson (CD) wrote previously he grew up in Hopewell Township, moved away (Chicago, New York, etc.) for about 40 years, and returned in 2007 to live in Raccoon Township, two municipalities away from Aliquippa. In addition to the City of Aliquippa, an Aliquippa mailing address includes all or parts of Center, Hopewell, Independence, and Raccoon townships. You can find more details using the BCR leftster link above.
CD’s steel history in this piece and elsewhere is more than a tad flawed and I’ll get into that later in the critique.
“So Aliquippa had the good luck Dec 24, Christmas Eve, to be on the receiving end of a $3 million grant from the state to help clean it up, in order to prepare for new industry. Most people praised our Mayor, Dwan Walker, for helping it along. But not some, such as one letter-writer in our local paper who asserted that retirees of the ‘greedy union’ should clean it up, since they made the mess and ‘profited’ from it.”
[RWC] “Our mayor?” As already noted, CD does not live in Aliquippa. I’ll leave it to readers to figure out why CD routinely writes as if he lives/lived in Aliquippa. Here’s a hint; I found no place where CD referred to the previous mayor (Anthony Battalini – 2003-2011, also a Democrat) as “our mayor.”
You probably noticed CD provided no link to the subject “letter.” One reason for that is there was no letter. The “letter” was simply one of the comments on a Beaver County Times story (“Future petrochemical-related site in Aliquippa gets $3M”; December 24, 2013) on the BCT website. CD also failed to note the person who wrote the comment was responding to a previous comment by CD. Here is the exchange.
Comment by Carl Davidson (posted at 12:06 pm on Tue, Dec 24, 2013.): “Now hire locally, at union scale, from the longer-term unemployed in Aliquippa, to do the work. There’s two ways to do these things. One way helps those most concerned; the other rips them off for the sake of those on top. Let’s see which wins.”
Response by “macalot” (posted at 1:52 am on Wed, Dec 25, 2013.) (I don’t know this commenter’s real name.): “They should have hired the old timers that made the mess there to clean it up and make the Union and the Company split the costs from millions they made with their greedy ways. Don’t forget those beloved union workers also profited and are just as responsible for making this a contaminated property. They saw it happening.. actually they made the mess and did nothing.... just like the bigwigs at the mill saw it and did nothing. I’m sick and tired of this union thing. Unions have become irrelevant due to their own undoing.
“What say you Carl??? What’s good for the goose is good for the gander as well.”
CD responded to macalot the next day. That response became this posting.
Who “praised” Mayor Walker for “helping [the grant] along?” While it’s possible Mr. Walker was involved somehow, a quick Google search found no hits to link the Mayor with the grant. As of this writing, the grant isn’t mentioned on the City of Aliquippa website or Mr. Walker’s campaign Facebook page. There’s a link to the grant story on the Mayor Dwan B Walker Facebook page but he made no comment. Politicians tend to toot their horns at the drop of a hat. It’s a little difficult to believe that if Mr. Walker played some role in getting the grant, he would not mention it. One of the Mayor’s lefty followers wasn’t happy, however, writing in a comment, “This sucks. Putting another polluting company next to our river. This company fouls the air, too. Would it kill us to put a clean energy company in Aliquippa????? GEEZ!!! All Betters cares about is money.” Mr. Betters isn’t putting any company on this property. Mr. Betters simply does what needs to be done to make the property attractive for some business to buy. I don’t know Mr. Betters, but I don’t think he’d refuse to sell the property to “a clean energy company” if it were the high bidder.
“The notion of ‘greedy unions’ tells us all we need to know about this guy.”
[RWC] Another likely reason CD didn’t provide a link is because he would rather not have readers know the complete content of the comment. As you can see above, the comment’s author also took shots at “the Company” and “bigwigs at the mill,” not just labor-union management and employees. Omitting these portions of the comment made it easy to bash “this guy” as an “Anti-Union Crank.”
“The workers at this steel mill and others earned every cent they got, and then produced the profits for the bosses as well. Where do you think wealth comes from? And some paid a heavier price—I had a grandfather and a cousin killed there.”
[RWC] In this context, “bosses” refers to the company’s shareholders.
In the interest of full disclosure, the Aliquippa Works employed my maternal grandfather, father, mother, and one of my brothers.
“In the last days, the union, nearly to a fault, made every concession it could to keep the mill open. But the owners decided they wanted to gamble in oil futures instead. ‘I’m in business to make money, not steel’ was the famous boss quote of the day.”
[RWC] The key phrase is “In the last days.” By that time it was too late. Among company management, labor union management, government, and the employees themselves, there was more than enough blame to go around. As early as the mid-1950s, everyone who should know knew the high steel demand/low supply bubble after World War II would be temporary. After all, pent-up consumer demand from the Depression and the war and the need to rebuild caused the bubble. All of these people, however, chose to “kick the can down the road,” opting for immediate gratification instead of long-term viability. Remember the four-month 1959 steel industry strike? Though I was only a kid at the time, I remember my Dad (a Tin Mill industrial engineer) telling my Mom everyone would eventually realize what a huge mistake they made because it opened the floodgates for imported steel to replace domestic production lost during the strike. Sure enough, even after the strike, domestic consumers continued importing steel because they liked the price and quality. This would have happened eventually anyway, but the strike hastened the process. Remember 13-week paid vacations every five years for the top 50% in terms of seniority?
In fairness, downsizing the U.S. steel industry was inevitable even if we made all the right moves. However, heeding the signs may have allowed a planned, though still painful, evolution. I mention other relevant issues in a previous critique of a letter-to-the-editor.
CD’s allegations in this paragraph go back at least as far as a 2008 blurb CD wrote on the CommunistsProgressivesForObama.blogspot.com website. CD also wrote something similar in November 2013: “People worry about cracking and fracking, and justly so, but making steel the J&L way was even more toxic. It was a trade-off we lived with, sweeping the ‘J&L pepper’ off our porches every morning. Goodness knows what it did to our lungs. But it didn’t have to go. US Steel still makes as much steel as it ever did in Chicago, only with one third the work force. No, the last owner of J&L simply said he wasn’t in business to make steel, but to make money, so he gutted it, and used the proceeds to speculate in oil futures, ‘making money’ but not making real wealth. Therein lies the argument for what we need today, a popular front vs finance capital.”
Let’s look at each claim.
First, the “oil futures” and “make money, not steel” comments actually were about USS, not LTV. What CD called “gambl[ing] in oil futures” was USS buying Marathon Oil Company in 1982. Since USS didn’t own the Aliquippa Works, it couldn’t “gut” the plant to fund the purchase of Marathon. Marathon returned to being an independent company in 2002. To use consistent language, LTV gambled in steel futures when it acquired J&L in 1968 and other steel companies in the 1970s and 1980s. USS also continued to gamble on steel futures when it acquired LTV’s tin mill business in 2001 and purchased National Steel Corporation assets out of bankruptcy in 2003. Regarding “make money, not steel,” David Roderick of USS (president or CEO & chairman depending on the date) allegedly made the comment in 1979. Newsflash; making money is why we form businesses.
CD misused the term “futures.” According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, futures are “Commercial contracts calling for the purchase or sale of specified quantities of a good at specified future dates. The good in question may be grain, livestock, precious metals, or financial instruments such as treasury bills. Up until the time the contract calls for the delivery of the good, the contract is subject to speculation.” Buying a business is not gambling in futures. The use of the term “futures” was an attempt to link LTV with one of the left’s current boogeymen, evil speculators.
CD failed to mention the United Steelworkers of America (USW) itself has gambled on “futures” in other industries. According to “Steelworkers a minority within their own union,” as of 2005 less than one-third (about 180,000 out of about 600,000) of USW “members [are] employed in the primary and fabricated metals industries.” This gambling on “futures” includes “the chemicals, glass, rubber, tires, transportation, utilities and container industries, and even health care.”
Second, CD wrote, “[J&L Aliquippa] didn’t have to go” but he didn’t mention any remedies. What about all of the other steelmaking facilities shut down? Could they too have been saved? If so, how?
Third, I don’t know what CD meant when he linked the Aliquippa Works and “job exporting of the 1980s.” I found nothing to indicate LTV owned or operated any steel facilities outside of the U.S.
Fourth, as for “US Steel still makes as much steel as it ever did in Chicago,” USS closed its South Chicago Works in 1992. If you check the USS website, you’ll find the only USS steel mill in Illinois is in Granite City at the other end of the state from Chicago. USS acquired the Granite City Works from National Steel in 2003. USS operates a tin mill acquired from LTV in East Chicago, but East Chicago is in Indiana. In fairness, it’s possible CD meant the Gary Works in nearby Gary, IN, though I don’t know about the production and employment figures.
“That tells you the nature of finance capital vs. productive capital. They ‘make money’ but they do not make wealth. Same as the folks who own casinos and race tracks. They make money, but no real wealth.”
[RWC] Hmm, sounds like labor-union management collecting dues to fund its political advocacy activities, “but no real wealth.”
Let’s look at “the folks who own casinos and race tracks.” According to Marxists.org, these businesses meet the definition of “productive capital” (“in which the owner of means of production and labour produces a product [in this case, entertainment] and puts it into the market in order to realise the surplus value, which is re-invested in means of production and labour.”) The folks who run these businesses sell entertainment, just like filmmakers, professional athletes, and so on. What about doctors?
There’s nothing wrong with “finance capital.” It’s just another opportunity for “us vs. them” politics.
“Cleaning up this ‘brownfield’ creates infrastructure that can attract some productive capital—and labor along with it—to make new wealth.”
[RWC] The “make new wealth” comment can’t be correct, can it? Don’t lefties depend on people believing the “fixed pie” lie? That is, one person’s (the “oppressor” in leftyspeak) success/wealth comes only at the expense of someone else (the “oppressed”). In other words, Bob has a mansion and you have a hut because Bob unfairly took your slice of the pie.
“Whether workers are hired locally and get a decent wage and a union is a point of struggle. We’ve always had to organize and fight to get anything. Otherwise, we’d still be working for slave masters or bowing down on our knees to Kings, Queens and the Lords on the Manor.”
[RWC] Note CD doesn’t define “a decent wage.” CD may mean a “living wage.”
Keep in mind it was CD’s political ancestors and contemporaries who fought to maintain slavery, segregation, and other means of discrimination at least through the 1960s. Of course, leftists still engage in these vile activities; they just modified their approach.
“The workers did indeed see the land being poisoned, and most supported the EPA rules against it. It was the owners who exported mills to Brazil and others places without EPAs.”
[RWC] Okay, since “the workers did indeed see the land being poisoned,” what did labor-union management do about it? Strike? Make it an issue during contract negotiations?
As far as I can tell, LTV didn’t export steel mills anywhere. Indeed, until its demise, LTV actually bought other domestic steel producers like Youngstown Sheet & Tube and Republic Steel in an effort to survive.
“Why do you think the frackers are afraid of union labor? Because union members have the backing and the backbone to report on toxic spills. Why are they afraid of local labor? Because the families of local workers live here too, and they also thus have good reason to oppose toxic dumping.”
[RWC] I reject CD’s premises that “frackers are afraid of union labor … [and] afraid of local labor.” That said, just about every employer tries to avoid labor-union management involvement in their business. As of 2012, only 6.6% of private-sector employees belonged to labor unions. There’s a reason.
As for “union members hav[ing] the backing and the backbone to report on toxic spills,” it’s fantasy. Unless something affects revenue (member dues) to spend on political advocacy, labor-union management couldn’t care less. For example, long after the 1964 Civil Rights Act was enacted, management of the United Steelworkers of America union, along with nine steel companies, was slapped with a federal consent decree in 1974 to address “discriminatory hiring, promotion, assignment, and wage policies directed against women and minorities.” The discrimination was determined to have affected 40,000 minority and women employees.
More recently, in 2007 the EEOC charged AK Steel – Butler with “creating and condoning a racially hostile work environment for a group of African American employees, which included widespread racist and threatening displays for years.” The EEOC fined AK Steel $600,000. What was union management (Butler-Armco Independent Union at the time) doing while this was going on? Shouldn’t union management have filed grievances on behalf of the offended employees long before employees had to involve the EEOC? If the offending employees were union members, couldn’t union management have handled the problem internally?
“But perhaps our ‘greedy union’ critic is right in a backhanded way. It may very well be that we can’t have capitalism along with jobs for all, a living wage and a healthy environment—not because it can’t be done theoretically, but out of sheer greed and stupidity. If so, I thank him for making my case for moving to socialism of the 21st century.”
[RWC] As a reminder, “our ‘greedy union’ critic” also criticized the “the Company” and “bigwigs at the mill.”
CD apparently wants readers to forget the Soviet Union, the other Iron Curtain countries, North Korea, and so on. I wasn’t there, but I suspect you don’t need walls to keep your citizens from leaving if your country is a worker and environmental paradise.
Folks, “socialism of the 21st century” is hogwash. All leftism variants lie on the same slippery slope and eventually end up at the same destination, complete control by government. With apologies to William Shakespeare, a skunk by any other name still stinks.
In Peace, Friendship, Community, Cooperation, and Solidarity. <g>
© 2004-2014 Robert W. Cox, all rights reserved.