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

DATE: FRIDAY, February 17, 1995                   TAG: 9502180035
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: A7   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: JEFF STURGEON STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

ACADIA PLANT LAYS OFF 125 IRON GATE OPERATION SOLD

Acadia Corp. in Roanoke has found a potential buyer for its Alleghany County rubber-products plant and has given layoff notices to half the plant's 250-person work force.

Company President Pat Malone was not available Thursday to discuss either development. Acadia operates seven rubber-products factories, including one in Iron Gate that makes piston seals for automobiles and rubber rollers for copiers.

The business is controlled by the Harbour Group, a St. Louis holding company, whose spokesman did not return several telephone calls Thursday.

Glynn Loope, executive director of the Alleghany Highlands Economic Development Authority, said company officials have given him a tentative sale date of March 31. The potential buyer's name was not disclosed.

Loope said he was led to believe that Acadia could emerge a stronger company after the layoffs and sale, if consummated.

"We're hoping this may be a short-term loss for a long-term gain," he said. "This is, from what we understand, a corporate restructuring."

Loope said he was cautiously optimistic that laid-off employees would be called back.

In announcing the layoffs to employees Monday, Plant Manager Stewart Schofe said workers who accept a severance package waive any chance of being recalled, according to a company employee who spoke Thursday but declined to give her name.

The layoff plans, the employee said, left workers at the plant "real bitter. We've just been through the strike. They'd been telling us to hang in there. The harder we worked, it would make our jobs more secure."

Employees did their best to work harder, said the woman, who will be laid off from her $7.89-an-hour job as a molder. The woman, a three-year employee, said she planned to refuse her severance package of about $700.

Employees, members of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, staged a one-week strike that ended Aug. 6. The walkout was over terms of a three-year contract now in effect. Union members said at the time that wages and benefits were reduced after the Harbour Group gained control of the company in 1991.

by CNB