By Staff
Local plant to get some new workers
By TED STRONG
Staff Writer
A reshuffling by Stanadyne Corp. will result in more jobs at its Washington plant, a company official said.
About 110 jobs are expected to be moved to North Carolina, where Stanadyne has factories in Washington and Jacksonville.
The full-time, hourly manufacturing jobs will be coming to Washington as a result of cuts at the company’s Windsor, Conn., facility. Because of a slow domestic automotive market, all three plants are operating below capacity, and Stanadyne had cut jobs at those plants earlier this year.
As a result, Stanadyne decided to consolidate. Stanadyne’s factories in Italy, China and India will deal with increasing demand abroad, while the North Carolina plants will cater to demand from domestic clients. Some U.S. jobs are being sent abroad, but only from the Connecticut plant, said Jean S. McCarthy, the company’s vice president for human resources. Engineering and corporate functions — the “brains” of the business — will stay in Connecticut. Overall, the company will see a reduction in its total number of manufacturing jobs.
McCarthy said the company decided to consolidate at its North Carolina plants because they’re smaller, newer and cost less to operate.
Stanadyne is one of the oldest manufacturing concerns still operating in the county, he said.
Displaced workers from Connecticut will be given priority for the jobs in North Carolina, but the details are still being worked out, McCarthy said. People who lost jobs in the earlier cuts also will be given consideration, she said.
The overall schedule for the job shuffle is between now and 2011, but McCarthy said Washington could see changes sooner than that.