Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, March 13, 1992                   TAG: 9203130251
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: A-7   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: GEORGE KEGLEY BUSINESS EDITOR
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

PLANT MAY HAVE BUYER

An investment group, identified only as Emergency Products Acquisition Corp., said it has signed a 30-day letter of intent to buy the plant. Whether it proceeds with the purchase depends on the investors' pulling together a satisfactory financial package.

John H. Saunders, a Roanoke corporate investment specialist, said the prospective buyers' objective "is to establish a Roanoke-headquartered company that will regain its position of leadership in the fire-equipment industry."

At stake are about 250 jobs. But Thursday's news drew skepticism from the factory's workers, who are scheduled to negotiate their severance pay today.

The Northeast Roanoke plant is scheduled to close by summer. The owner, Grumman Corp., a Bethpage, N.Y., aerospace company, announced in November it would shut the operation if it could not find a buyer.

The proposed deal was assembled by Saunders' firm, Princeton Associates Inc. Saunders "has been working very hard on this for months," said Brian Wishneff, Roanoke's director for economic development.

Until financial arrangements are complete, however, "we'll have to be patient and see if the deal is consummated," he said.

Saunders' brief announcement said investigations of the financial background of the buyers, definitive purchase agreements and financial audits had not been completed.

At Grumman headquarters, the company said the letter of intent "gives the interested parties time to settle a number of conditions that must be met before the sale can take place."

The factory continues to make fire engines, but its workload is winding down as no new orders have been taken.

About 50 fire engines remain to be built, according to reports by Local 751 of the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union, which represents production workers.

Four engines are being built and sent to the paint shop each week, according to a Grumman worker who spoke on the condition he not be identified. But that rate could be slowed by the dwindling work force, delaying a closing.

The purchase announcement is just "a morale boost to keep us going," the plant worker said. "A lot of them [in the plant] think it's a farce to get the trucks done. . . . They've been stringing us along."

Bill Bruns, president of the local company, told employees there would be no layoffs "anytime soon," the worker said, quoting union officials.

But workers' more immediate concern is negotiations over severance pay. They hope for benefits similar to what some office workers received when they were laid off just before Christmas: almost a week's pay for each year worked, according to the employee.

Several would-be buyers have visited the plant, but Thursday's announcement of a letter of intent is the second apparently significant proposal to buy. In December, Robert Evans, a financial executive from Detroit, made an offer but withdrew it after the union rejected his demand for new contract terms.