Simplot plans big layoff
More than 100 workers will be let go
By JOHN MILLER
Associated Press
Tuesday, June 2, 2009 10:57 AM PDT
BOISE — J.R. Simplot Co. plans to issue layoff notices to 114 employees at a phosphate mine and a fertilizer plant, blaming legal challenges from environmental groups trying to halt the agricultural conglomerate’s proposed expansion of the mine near the Idaho-Wyoming border.
The 36 layoffs at the Smoky Canyon mine are set to take place Saturday, with 78 job reductions at the Don fertilizer plant near Pocatello slated for July 11.
In late May, a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals stopped the company from preparing for the expansion, with the judges saying they needed more time to review all the issues.
Garrett Lofto, president of Simplot’s AgriBusiness Group, said Monday the company could shutter Smoky Canyon and the fertilizer plant completely in 18 months if the situation isn’t resolved. The mine is the only supplier of the Don plant, shipping phosphate beneath three counties in an underground pipeline.
‘‘The delays caused by special interest groups over the past nine months have placed us in a no-win situation,’’ said Lofto in a news release, adding Simplot has released 199 contracting company workers, and has not filled 22 vacant positions.
The mine employs 210 workers, while the plant has 350 employees. The company says it has less than a year of phosphate ore left; the proposed expansion would keep the mine and the plant operating through 2025.
‘‘It is essential that the company complete expansion of the new sections simultaneously with exhausting existing sections in order to provide a steady and reliable supply of ore to our Pocatello plant,’’ Lofto said.
Environmental groups including the Greater Yellowstone Coalition oppose the mine expansion, fearing it would further harm a region already polluted from past phosphate mining. Pollution from other mines in the 1990s resulted in the deaths of horses and hundreds of sheep grazing in areas tainted by selenium.
Marv Hoyt, director of the Greater Yellowstone Coalition’s Idaho Falls office, said he suspects layoffs may also be a function of the economy, not just litigation, with rival fertilizer makers like Canada’s Agrium Inc.
