Loss of Hughes: Reality Bites : The region can adapt in painful economic times
Southern California’s struggling economy was jolted with yet another piece of discouraging news from the shrinking defense industry this week. While the announcement that Hughes Aircraft Co. will close its huge Fullerton aerospace complex was not unexpected, that did not diminish either its significance or its pain.
The ripple effect on the local economy is bound to test the resources of a city that over the years had close ties with the company. Auto dealerships, restaurants and other businesses depended on Hughes employees.
Fullerton long has emphasized good planning, and it made a valiant effort to retain the 6,800 jobs. In the wings are developers eyeing the property for housing. Although 800 to 1,000 jobs will be eliminated, other positions will be transferred to Hughes sites in El Segundo and Long Beach. Those factors may blunt the pain but cannot erase it.
The fact that Fullerton could not prevail was a sign of the times. In the battle to retain longstanding institutions buffeted by economic change, the region surely will win some, as it did in the successful effort to keep Taco Bell’s headquarters in Irvine, and will lose some, too. This loss--let’s be candid--bites.
Local officials must be undaunted and make the case to retain threatened industries, fighting a door-to-door battle if necessary to retain jobs. It will not be easy. The UCLA Business Forecasting Project sees even more downsizing in the defense industry. While the many new start-up ventures are encouraging, the big hits like the Hughes closing are akin to a meteorite landing in a garden patch.
Cuts in military spending played a crucial role in bringing on these cosmic developments. The Cold War was a perilous time for the nation, but ironically it fueled prosperity in the spread of defense-related industries and in the spawning of an optimistic way of American life--especially in the suburbs that surround Los Angeles.
The challenge for Southern California, as always, will be to adapt to economic and social forces. The tide that transformed orange groves into high-tech centers and housing tracts today is moving in the direction of a global economy.
Change is never easy, but it has been a part of the life of the region from the beginning. For the time being at least, it is forcing a painful reckoning with new economic realities--a process especially difficult for affected individuals and families who must put lives and livelihoods on a new track.
The region can emerge stronger from the adversity if we all maintain the sense of hard-working optimism that brought most of us here in the first place. That--and continued attention to vigorous economic development and reducing government red tape--is a good prescription for a lot that ails us.
