Defense Firms Urged to Retrain Laid-Off Workers

Laid-off defense workers, such as the several thousand being let go by Lockheed in Burbank, urgently need government retraining and extended unemployment benefits, labor leaders and municipal officials told two congressional subcommittees meeting in Southern California on Monday.

The panels were seeking input on a bill that would allocate $200 million from the defense budget to retrain and provide unemployment compensation for displaced workers and to help hard-hit communities make the transition to nonmilitary industries in the wake of large defense budget cuts. Los Angeles County would be a major beneficiary of the program.

“Many of our members have highly specialized aircraft manufacturing skills,” said A.E. (Charlie) Brown, president of District 727 of the International Assn. of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, which represents Lockheed employees. “However, since we are already experiencing major aerospace cutbacks throughout the country, and most notably in Southern California, our workers have nowhere to turn.”

The hearing was held by Rep. Mary Rose Oakar (D-Ohio), chairwoman of the banking, finance and urban affairs subcommittee on economic stabilization and author of the defense conversion bill, and Rep. Esteban E. Torres (D-La Puente), chairman of the small business subcommittee on environment and labor. About 70 defense workers and labor representatives attended at the headquarters of Local 887 of the United Aerospace Workers in Paramount.

Congressional Democrats, concerned that their support for defense cutbacks could be political dynamite if it leads to wholesale layoffs in their districts, are espousing “economic conversion” to cushion the blow. Oakar’s bill, which passed her subcommittee last week, has elicited a chilly reception from the Republican Bush Administration.

“None of us believes defense spending justifies jobs,” said Rep. Julian C. Dixon (D-Los Angeles), a member of the House Appropriations Committee who also attended the hearing. At the same time, he said the federal government, which has fueled the defense firms, must help workers avert the pain of peace between the United States and the Soviet Union and its European allies.

Lockheed Corp. was sharply criticized. Brown said the company’s decision to move much of its operation from Burbank to Marietta, Ga., by the mid-1990s was precipitated by mismanagement, not defense cuts as the company insists. The firm has rejected all union overtures “to ease the pain of the many workers who have served them so loyally,” he said.

Torres and Dixon also lambasted Lockheed, as well as Northrop Corp. and McDonnell Douglas Corp., for failing to send representatives to the hearing as requested by the panels.

“It’s difficult to believe that these companies care about their civic responsibilities when they don’t show up,” Torres said. They “are sending a very loud and clear message to their members and to their communities.”

Reached later by telephone, Stephen Chaudet, Lockheed’s vice president for public affairs, said the company was analyzing Oakar’s bill and will respond to her subcommittee in writing. He said not attending the hearing “doesn’t mean we’re not concerned.”

A defense industry executive for another firm, who requested anonymity, said: “The feeling among the aerospace companies was that it was a staged meeting and that by holding it at the union hall it wasn’t going to be a fair hearing. It wasn’t a neutral venue. It was being staged for the benefit of the unions.”

Times staff writer Howard Blume also contributed to this story.

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