ICYMI: Arkansas company begins laying off workers due to delay in the Keystone XL pipeline
LITTLE ROCK, AR -- Layoffs and a brief company shutdown is what employees face at Welspun Tubular Company, which makes steel pipes for the oil industry.
Company leaders say miles of pipe are on the property and that has caused five dozen employees to lose their jobs. The pipes would be part of the Keystone oil pipeline, which is a project running oil from Canada to Texas.
But plans are delayed on the federal level. Now leaders say the local job market is affected.
"We had to make a staffing reduction with some of the temporary employees. Due to the KXL pipeline not being shipped out. We have 500 miles of pipe just sitting in the yard, expected to be shipped out, that some of the employees were working on," said President Dave Delie.
But there is another problem employees face. Managers say they will soon shut down a portion of the site because there is no work. The problem will last three weeks, beginning the week before Christmas and leaving 200 hundred workers with no income.
Delie says there is a problem with a steel shipment from overseas. Therefore, there are no materials to work.
"There were some weather delays and the vessel that was loading the steel got delayed and delayed the steel several weeks. So unfortunately that means the steel didn't get here on time," said Delie.
Now some Welspun employees will have to find other financial ways to have a happy holiday.
###
For additional information, contact:
House Republican Conference Press Office (conferencepress@mail.house.gov)
