Looking back, moving forward year after mill's closing

The announcement dazed Sean Kerlee.

A few months before, in the summer of 2009, International Paper CEO John Faraci had visited the mill outside Franklin, praising its profitability.

Then, on Oct. 22,

International Paper officials told workers at the mill - which had churned out paper for 60-plus years and stood as a linchpin for the Franklin and Isle of Wight County economy - that it would close in 2010.

"We were making millions and never lost money," said Kerlee, who joined the paper mill in 1993. "Then, one day, just to shut it down: That was a big, big blow."

He found a new job quickly. In January, he began work as a crane operator - the position he held for most of his tenure at the mill - at Northrop Grumman Shipbuilding in Newport News.

Kerlee is philosophical about the transition: The pay's a bit less, the commute longer, and he has to work overnights. But he's

impressed with Northrop Grumman's concern for safety and with his bosses

- and he's grateful to be employed.

"I consider myself very lucky and very blessed that the Lord provided me a job so fast," Kerlee, 40, said in his house in Suffolk last week.

Many others also have found work in the year since the announcement about the mill, which ceased operation in April.

Randy Betz, vice president of work force development at Paul D. Camp Community College, has been in touch with many of the 1,100 people who worked at the mill. By his count, at least 400 have landed new jobs. Most, he said, have remained in the area.

But that leaves hundreds still out of work, pumping Franklin's jobless rate to 12.2 percent, among the region's highest, with no new major employer to take up the slack and the future of the property still unknown.

Ralph Vincent Jr., a 33-year mill veteran, was profiled by The Pilot in June after his final day there. He said last week that he hasn't found work yet. He has delayed his search as he recovers from surgery to repair a ruptured disc in his neck.

Of his colleagues at the mill, "most of them have found jobs that they want to work," said Vincent, 52, of Franklin. "But it seems like nobody wants to hire us guys over 50."

Kerlee has plenty of company at the shipyard.

Northrop Grumman has hired 124 former mill workers, spokeswoman Margaret Mitchell-Jones said. That's more than any other employer has taken on, Betz said.

In positions such as pipe fitter, machinist and electrician, they "are working out great," Mitchell-Jones said. "These candidates came from a manufacturing background, and they have a strong concern for safety and quality production."

International Paper still employs about 100 people who worked at the mill, said Donna Wadsworth, a spokeswoman in Ticonderoga, N.Y. About 70 are working at other International Paper locations, she said, and 30 remain at the site outside Franklin, "primarily involved in records management and site preservation."

Still other former workers are at the mill, working for contractors.

Highground Services Inc. of Franklin, an industrial controls and engineering company, has hired 29 mill workers, said Jim Strozier, its chief operating officer. About half work at the mill in such areas as managing sewer or storeroom systems or helping ship equipment.

Highground's salaries are competitive, Strozier said, but "somewhat lower than what they were making." That doesn't seem to have impeded its recruitment.

"We have gotten guys who have a very strong work ethic, very strong technical skills," he said. "They're the kind of employees anybody would want to pick up."

Tony Dunn, 51, a former training coordinator at International Paper, started at Highground as a technical writer in mid-May.

The salary, Dunn said, is comparable. He said he likes the new job better. "I had to work a lot of OT before, and I don't have that now," the Franklin resident said. "I feel very fortunate to get a job with such a good company."

More than 100 mill workers have enrolled in college or begun other training, often subsidized by federal funding, Betz said. They're preparing for new careers in fields such as plumbing, nursing and information technology.

Of the students, more than 70 are enrolled at Paul D. Camp and about 30 are at Tidewater Community College, Betz said.

Al Faison, who had been at the mill for 25 years, began courses at TCC last spring to become a radiography technician.

"I didn't want to go back into manufacturing, if possible," said Faison, 45, of Franklin. "It seems like our culture is migrating more to services."

Federal funding covers his tuition and provides him an $806 stipend every two weeks. Faison has gotten straight A's, but he won't breathe easy until he finds out at the end of the year whether he is accepted into the radiography program.

"Once I complete my training, I feel positive I'll be at a level I never have been before in my life," he said. "I'll be marketable and will have a skill set that will be very much needed."

Mill workers such as millwrights or electricians have had better luck, Betz said.

"For the most part, the skilled trades have wider applicability in business and industry," he said. "They tend to be more easily placed."

For plenty of mill workers, though, the job search has been far from easy.

In the most recent data, the unemployment rate for Franklin/Southampton County hit 12.2 percent in August, compared with 7.4 percent for Hampton Roads. Williamsburg was the only local area topping Franklin, with a 14.2 percent unemployment rate.

Isle of Wight County, where the mill sits, had a jobless rate of 7.2 percent. The county's employment status, said Gerald Gwaltney, its commissioner of the revenue, has been buoyed by Northrop Grumman and defense contracts.

The county expects a drop in revenue next year of $6 million, or more than 6 percent of its budget, because International Paper will no longer pay the machine-and-tool tax, he said.

"I think the reality of the closure, from an economic standpoint, is really setting in now," Franklin Mayor Jim Councill said. "If you talk to individual businesses, you find that sales are down. It hasn't been a doomsday thing, but it's been very tight for businesses."

Local officials have said they are working hard to attract new employers. Accelerated Financial Solutions, a Chesapeake-based debt collection firm, recently opened an office outside Smithfield, adding 30 jobs. But a major employer has yet to announce its arrival.

That, residents hope, will occur when International Paper decides what it will do with the mill.

Kerlee said he's heard talk that another company will restart two of the mill's five paper machines. Other rumors have International Paper making paper there once more.

The company, in its most detailed statement on the future of the property, last week ruled out "plans for paper or paperboard to be produced at the site."

Spokeswoman Donna Wadsworth said the company is considering proposals to convert the mill into an operation producing items such as "wood pellets, lumber, fluff pulp, ethanol, biomass power generation and biodiesel."

The only bidder to be identified, Democratic Party activist Terry McAuliffe, has proposed turning the mill into a wood-fired electricity generation plant.

"Some of the repurposing alternatives," Wadsworth said in an e-mail, "could be complementary," with two or more companies working at the site on different projects.

International Paper, she said, has not excluded the possibilities of maintaining ownership of the site or participating in future operations.

Wadsworth said a decision probably will not be announced until early next year, after International Paper completes environmental, engineering and economic studies.

Councill voiced optimism: "We're led to believe it's a very promising outlook."

Kerlee, who was an assistant evaporator operator when he left the mill, spoke almost reverently of his job. There never was a day, he said, that he didn't want to go to work.

The new job at Northrop Grumman has led to adjustments.

Kerlee's wife has switched from part-time to full-time work at a doctor's office to make up for his decline in pay. He's still getting used to the full-time 11 p.m.-

7 a.m. shift. At the mill, he'd alternate shifts.

But he described Northrop Grumman as a "great place to work."

His co-workers are "a really good bunch of guys," he said, and his two foremen are also first-rate.

And Kerlee praised Northrop Grumman for seeking out his former colleagues. Even now, he said, managers at the shipyard ask him if he knows good mill workers who could fill openings.

Still, it's hard not to look back. When he does, he winces.

"The mill sitting idle when I know it can make money... " Kerlee said. "When I think about it now, it's still a hard pill to swallow."

Philip Walzer, (757) 222-3864, phil.walzer@pilotonline.com