Abex Says Oxnard Plant May Be Closed : Aerospace industry: The company warns the 630 employees of possible layoffs. It cites a slump and restructuring.
In a move signaling continuing troubles for Ventura County’s aerospace industry, a major county defense contractor has notified all 630 employees at its Oxnard headquarters and plant of a possible mass layoff and plant closure.
Abex Aerospace said the possible cutbacks would be caused by the need for a corporate restructuring and declining orders for military aircraft parts.
The company stressed that the notice issued Wednesday did not amount to the formal 60-day notification required under the federal law, but was intended to prepare employees for potentially deep staff reductions.
“It doesn’t say that things will happen, but that they may happen,” said Randall H. Holliday, the company’s chief lawyer. “The company is looking at any of a number of possible options.”
The prospect that some jobs will be spared was little consolation to Abex employees. While layoffs were widely anticipated, because Abex had laid off 230 people since early 1990, many employees reacted to the notification with trepidation.
“It’s still a shocker,” said Peter Marquez, 47, an Abex machine operator for 12 years. “We sort of knew it was coming, but everyone was hoping it wouldn’t.”
“A lot of people are pretty worried,” said an Abex engineer who requested anonymity because he expects that his job may be spared.
Abex Aerospace moved its headquarters and manufacturing plant to Oxnard in 1960 from Rochester, N.Y. The company makes hydraulic pumps and valves for aircraft control systems, Holliday said.
If Abex proceeds with full-scale layoffs, its employees face the same misfortune as thousands of aerospace workers throughout Ventura County who have lost jobs over the last two years because of defense spending cuts and corporate restructurings.
Litton Industries abandoned plans last month to move a 1,500-employee division into its Moorpark navigation-equipment plant, which will close as planned later this year, with 600 jobs relocated to a Woodland Hills plant.
Northrop Corp. closed its Newbury Park missile plant last September. It once employed 2,000 people.
And Raytheon Co. laid off 400 people in 1990 when it closed its Oxnard missile-tracking plant.
“The notice (from Abex) is not good news, the way the economy is,” said Raul Ramirez of the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers Union, which represents about 400 Abex production workers who earn $10 to $17.50 an hour.
“Even with the advanced notice, it’s always difficult,” Ramirez said. “The job market in Ventura County does not offer a lot of opportunity right now, especially not at the rate of pay the workers have been enjoying here.”
Holliday said Abex suffered severely when the Pentagon canceled contracts for the A-12 carrier jet and the B-2 Stealth bomber. Further cuts are expected, he said.
“We know the military has retreated in terms of both fighter aircraft and other aircraft in the inventory,” Holliday said. “Development programs that were anticipated to go to production are not coming through.”
Ramirez said the union has been told that the company may continue manufacturing commercial aircraft parts in Oxnard, while moving military contracts to a plant in Michigan. He said that scenario would still result in as many as half the Oxnard employees losing their jobs.
He said Abex also is planning to open an assembly and testing center in Hong Kong. Holliday said that move would take about 40 jobs from the Oxnard plant.
The federal Worker Adjustment Retraining Notification Act requires that employers give 60-day notice in advance of a plant closure or the layoff of 50% of the work force or 100 employees. That notice “may still be out there somewhere” in the future, Holliday said.
Times correspondent Jack Searles contributed to this story.
