Former Wolverine employees struggle: Job prospects fade, unemployment benefits close to running out

Nov 30, 2008 (The Decatur Daily - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- WLVTE | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating -- Take a moment to consider your monthly expenses. There's the utility bill, rent or mortgage, phone bill, cable bill, insurance, gasoline and groceries.

Now imagine that your monthly income dropped from up to $4,000 per month to $840 a month, as it did for Ricky Coker, 52, when Wolverine Tube closed in January.

Coker and many other former Wolverine employees who have not managed to find another job will lose their $840-per-month unemployment compensation in the next few weeks, and they don't know what they will do.

"We were told there were 3,000 jobs out there, that we wouldn't have any trouble finding jobs," Coker said. "I'd like to know where those 3,000 jobs are at."

The timing of the demise of Wolverine's Decatur plant could not have been much worse. Its problems had little to do with the current economic crisis, but recessionary conditions began soon after.

Employment opportunities, plentiful in 2007, dried up this year.

Coker has applied for dozens of jobs, but rarely gets a response, much less an interview.

"They've got jobs in the paper," he said, "but if you're not certified or don't have a master's degree or stuff like that, you may as well hang it up."

Under Wolverine's retirement plan, employees could retire at age 55 and receive 80 percent of their "approved benefit," a pension amount that factors in years of service and rate of pay.

Employees who left at age 54, however, receive a maximum of 34 percent of the approved benefit, regardless of the years they worked at the plant.

Wolverine treated the date of closing, Jan. 6, as the retirement date for the Decatur employees. Thus, employees who turned 55 after the closing date will receive, at most, 34 percent of their retirement benefit. They cannot collect that amount until they are 55.

Coker worked 32 years at Wolverine. His father, who also worked at Wolverine, got him the job when Coker was 20.

A month's delay in receiving unemployment benefits, plus expenses that exceed his unemployment compensation, forced him to exhaust his $10,000 individual retirement savings.

Coker remains stubbornly optimistic that he will get a job before his unemployment compensation runs out.

"I'm praying and hoping I'll have one by the end of the year," he said.

There is no Plan B.

Living off retirement

Dorothy Griffith was 55 when the plant closed and had 22 years at Wolverine Tube. She is living off her retirement: $668 per month.

She made about $2,000 a month at Wolverine.

Griffith has applied for more than 50 jobs, she figures, and like Coker she rarely gets a response.

Hampering her ability to find a job is a knee injury, suffered at Wolverine, which still gives her fits after three surgeries.

Griffith has paid off her home, and she used bonus money she received when the plant closed to pay off her car.

She has had to use some of her retirement savings to help bridge the gap between her pension and living expenses, but there's not much left.

"I thought I was set," Griffith said. "I knew I could go out at 55, but I wasn't planning on it. I planned to work until I was at least 60."

She is thankful she paid off her house, but she is quickly realizing that keeping her house requires money she does not have.

"My house is needing repairs that I can't afford to do," she explained. "I need new flooring. The land next to me doesn't have a culvert, so the moisture comes down on my land. My floor is dipping and it keeps getting worse."

Like Coker, she has discovered that the available jobs in North Alabama require skills she does not have, and that she could not have known she one day would need.

"You've got to be a rocket scientist to get on at Daikin and some of these places," she said.

Had she known she would need to be a "rocket scientist" to live, she would have prepared herself for that years ago. But she had a good job at a stable company.

Even when job openings fit her qualifications, her age is an unstated but constant barrier.

"They say they don't discriminate against age," she said, "but they do."

Betty Davidson, who had been at Wolverine for two months shy of 30 years when the plant closed, also is under 55.

It is an unusual day when she does not submit an application. She starts every day on the Internet -- she has kept her computer and an Internet connection despite the cost -- looking for job openings.

"Every time I hear of a job, I apply for it," she said.

But 11 months after Wolverine closed, she has found nothing. She has applied everywhere from Decatur to Mobile to Oklahoma, but nothing.

"I worked 30 years at Wolverine. Really, I had 30 years of training at Wolverine," she said. "You'd think that would help me find a job, but it has not. I never thought I'd still be looking for a job."

She takes no comfort from the fact that many others soon will share her plight, and soon will be competing for the few available jobs. Employees from Delphi, BASF, Solutia and Cerro Wire are facing, or soon will face, the trauma of being without a job.

Starting all over

Davidson is worried about what she will do when her unemployment compensation runs out in a few weeks, but she also is frightened about what she will do when she is too old to work.

"Being over 50 and having to start all over again, I won't ever live long enough to be eligible for another retirement," she said.

Like Coker, she deals with the unthinkable prospect of not finding a job before her

unemployment compensation runs out by denying the possibility.

"Every day," she said, fidgeting with her shirt sleeve, "I think this is the day I'm going to get a job."

Health insurance

Davidson has continued her Wolverine health insurance. Coker and Griffith had to let it lapse.

"My insurance was going to be 300-something dollars a month, and that was half of what I am making," Griffith said. "I just couldn't do it."

She is grateful for the Community Free Clinic of Decatur-Morgan County, which has been her safety net for medical problems. It is not designed for all health problems, though.

"I have teeth that need fixing. They don't fix them. They'll pull them, but they won't fix them," Griffith said. Then, with rare laughter, "I don't need to lose any more!"

Coker's wife, who depended on his Wolverine insurance, needs medical care.

"My wife needs some stuff done, but we can't have it done without insurance," he said. "As soon as I find a job..."

On medical issues that the Free Clinic does not handle, Griffith finds that private doctors will not treat her.

"It's bad," she said. "We worked all those years. I had 22 years in, but I have no insurance. A doctor won't hardly see you without insurance."

Despite their post-Wolverine poverty, despite the imminent end of unemployment compensation, despite deteriorating homes and medical problems they cannot handle, the three talk most about their families.

Curbing generosity

Christmas is coming, and it is the first Christmas they remember when they had to curb their generosity.

"My grandkids want things, but I just can't get the money to buy things for them anymore," Coker said. Then his refrain: "I'm hoping to get a job one of these days, so I can do right by them."

Gifts are beyond his reach, but so are the basics he wants to give them.

"I try to give them everything they need. I've had to kind of slack up," he said. "I always tried to keep their clothes good, make sure they had school supplies. I just can't do as much as I want to now."

Unable to splurge

Grandma Griffith took great pleasure in Christmases past. She loved to spoil her grandchildren, being more lavish with them than were their parents. ("I guess I shouldn't have done that," she said, "but it was so fun!")

She was into Christmas clubs. She splurged. She decorated. Christmas was her special treat for her children and grandchildren.

"It's hard this year," she said, eyes averted. "Every year I had them a nice Christmas. The youngest ones don't hardly understand what's changed; the older ones understand a little better. It was special to me to do that for my grandkids. This year it's just going to be a little bit of something. It's a sad time."

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