GM LORDSTOWN Mayor: Supplier to bring new jobs

Lordstown tried to land the plant but didn't have a big enough building.
By DON SHILLING
VINDICATOR BUSINESS EDITOR
A General Motors supplier plans to reopen the former Tamco warehouse in Austintown, said Lordstown Mayor Michael Chaffee.
Nothing official has been announced by the supplier, Comprehensive Logistics, but Chaffee said village officials have learned about its plan in discussions with GM, suppliers and developers.
David Ditzler, an Austintown Township trustee, said he has heard that a couple of hundred jobs could be created if Tamco is reopened as an automotive supply plant.
A company official, Don Constantini, declined to comment on Comprehensive Logistics's relationship with GM. He is the chief executive of Falcon Transport in Austintown, the parent company of Comprehensive Logistics.
Logistics involves coordinating shipments for companies. Falcon employs 2,200 people, including 575 in this area.
The warehouse is owned by Giant Eagle, the Pittsburgh-based grocery store chain. Rob Borella, a company spokesman, said officials are talking to several companies interested in the warehouse but no deals have been finalized.
What's behind this
Chaffee said, however, that village officials have learned that Comprehensive Logistics won a sequencing contract from GM. Companies handling sequencing take parts from suppliers and send them to car assembly plants in the proper order.
Chaffee said he was disappointed to learn that Comprehensive Logistics intends to set up its sequencing plant in Austintown, not Lordstown. The company has a smaller plant in Lordstown.
The sequencing operation requires 300,000 square feet, and Lordstown doesn't have a building that size that's available, he said.
Company officials didn't have enough time to erect a new building because GM wants the sequencing operation running by May or June, when test models of the Chevrolet Cobalt are scheduled to be built at the Lordstown car assembly plant.
GM is awarding new contracts for suppliers as part of its nearly $1 billion upgrade of its Lordstown complex in advance of Cobalt production.
The former Tamco warehouse on Victoria Road has been closed since November.
Snyders Drug Stores of Minnesota had operated a warehouse there for a year and employed 140. The warehouse closed after the company ran into financial trouble and filed for bankruptcy protection.
The warehouse operated under the Tamco name when it supplied Phar-Mor, a Youngstown-based drugstore chain that went out of business in 2002. The warehouse employed 250 at the time, although it had once employed more than 1,000.