From Pekin Times: Hundreds of mostly office employees received layoff notices at one of the largest Caterpillar Inc. facilities in the Peoria area this week, just as the company announced plans to close overseas production plants and eliminate thousands more positions.
A total of 300 support and management employees at Building AC and the Tech Center in Mossville this week received job loss notifications that included severance packages, 60 days notice and mandated Illinois Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act letters.
The WARN Act letters are required under certain conditions, including plant closures and mass layoffs of at least 250 people, and must be filed with agencies such as the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity.
“We issued out WARN letters to the appropriate agencies and employees,” Caterpillar spokeswoman Rachel Potts said Friday. “The letter does not reflect other reductions at our facilities in the area.”
The company did not disclose the number of layoffs this week at other locations in the region. The layoffs generally take effect by Oct. 31, and Caterpillar announced it would work to place some of those employees in new positions within the company while helping others find work elsewhere.
In its initial confirmation of the layoffs Monday, the company reiterated its commitment to Peoria, where it has been headquartered for 91 years, and the surrounding area.
The layoffs initiated in Mossville and other facilities in the Peoria area this week largely consisted of engineers working in divisions that Caterpillar announced last month would be consolidated, resulting in significant work force reductions beyond the 10,000 job cuts announced last fall as part of a company-wide restructuring.
Those plans also resulted in the announcement of thousands of intended job cuts overseas by the end of the week — in Northern Ireland and Belgium.
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