Checking in with former GM Lordstown workers

It's been 3 years since 1,500 of Lordstown General Motor's remaining workers were forced to pick up and move or find a different job after the plant closed its doors.
Fast forward to 2022, the village now has the Ultium Cells Battery Plant and Foxconn as electric vehicles continue to pick up. 21 News checked in with GM workers who have had to relocate on what the future holds for them.
"Both of my grandparents worked in the steel mills," said Dave Green, a hot metal driver for GM in Bedford, Indiana. "My father worked at the Lordstown plant. I don't know if I'm going to move back and just stay there and retire."
Green also served as the UAW Local 1112 Union President.
Union President Dave Green picked up and moved to GM's Bedford, Indiana location in August of 2019. He told 21 News the union is still eying the arbitration regarding the contract language on the legality of shutting down the plant.
"I can't stress how frustrating this has been," Green said. "Our members are still waiting to find out if they're going to be made whole. They're trying to get a mutually satisfactory retirement."
Green said the union has gone through arbitration in regards to the language that wouldn't be agreed upon involving the "allocating" wording.
"All of these people who have been displaced are still sitting out there trying to find out if they're eligible for the MSR or if they can move closer to home," Green said.
Former Lordstown GM workers still pay close attention to the future of Lordstown Motors and the Ultium cells battery plant. Green told 21 News the electric vehicle future will offer much fewer jobs but he is hoping Ultium Cells workers unionize.
"The EVs themselves have fewer parts and will require fewer people to build," Green said. "On top of that, corporations like GM have outsourced a lot of work that people are doing. One example of that is the battery plant in Lordstown. It's split with a foreign-owned, non-union company. The UAW workers are not able to transfer to those locations."
George Farris now works in Fort Wayne, Indiana, and told 21 News Thursday that he doesn't have high hopes for Foxconn and couldn't see Lordstown Motors creating a successful truck.
"When it comes to Foxconn, I think all these CEOs they keep going through are going to make a lot of money and that's about it," Farris said. "Talking Lordstown Motors, if they even produce a vehicle to sell, it will be in a car museum 75 years from now that never came up with anything."
"All I see is pictures of it and no production models," Farris went on to say. "Working in a truck plant, it is hard to make a profit off of vehicles."
Farris said he wouldn't say no to moving back to the Valley eventually but the pay is the catch.
"No one has pizza like Youngstown," Farris said jokingly, "If the job was the same as this, yes I would 100% move back to Youngstown. I don't think that is a possibility in the near future."
On Friday, Ohio U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown will join leaders from General Motors to announce a new investment at a transmission plant in Toledo. The plant would support battery electric vehicle production, making it the first GM propulsion plant to receive an allocation of funds for electric vehicles. The Toledo plant currently has about 17 hundred employees.
"Absolutely, 100% we are going electric," Farris said. "I don't believe in the ambitious timetable. It'll take longer than what everyone is talking about."
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