Arizona – TheNewsHub https://thenewshub.in Fri, 18 Oct 2024 21:54:14 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.7 Stellantis to shutter and sell large testing facility amid cost-cutting efforts https://thenewshub.in/2024/10/18/stellantis-to-shutter-and-sell-large-testing-facility-amid-cost-cutting-efforts/ https://thenewshub.in/2024/10/18/stellantis-to-shutter-and-sell-large-testing-facility-amid-cost-cutting-efforts/?noamp=mobile#respond Fri, 18 Oct 2024 21:54:14 +0000 https://thenewshub.in/2024/10/18/stellantis-to-shutter-and-sell-large-testing-facility-amid-cost-cutting-efforts/

Carlos Tavares, chief executive officer of Stellantis NV, speaks to the media at the Stellantis auto manufacturing plant in Sochaux, France, on Thursday, Oct. 3, 2024. 

Nathan Laine | Bloomberg | Getty Images

DETROIT — Automaker Stellantis plans to shutter and sell its large vehicle proving grounds in Arizona at the end of this year, CNBC has learned.

The decision is the latest cost-cutting measure by the trans-Atlantic automaker under CEO Carlos Tavares, who has been increasingly under pressure from Wall Street, dealers and the United Auto Workers union amid the company’s lagging financial performance, layoffs and overall business decisions.

The Arizona Proving Grounds covers 4,000 acres between Phoenix and Las Vegas in Yucca, Arizona. It has been used for vehicle testing and development for the automaker since then-Chrysler purchased the property for $35 million from Ford Motor in 2007.

The closure was confirmed by three people familiar with the plans who agreed to speak on the condition of anonymity because the matters are private.

Stellantis plans to use a proving grounds in Arizona owned by Toyota Motor beginning next year, according to two people familiar with the decision. Toyota opened its operations, which are costly to maintain, for other companies to use in 2021.

Stellantis Chrysler Arizona Proving Grounds

Source: Google Earth

Stellantis confirmed the closure Friday morning, citing the company’s ongoing cost-cutting and real estate evaluations.

“Stellantis continues to look for opportunities to improve efficiency and optimize its footprint to ensure future competitiveness in today’s rapidly changing global market,” the company said in an emailed statement.

The automaker also said it is “working with the UAW to offer proving ground employees special packages or they can choose to follow their work in a transfer of operations” but that employees could be placed on an “indefinite layoff, which would entitle them to pay and benefits for two years.”

Stellantis said 41 employees currently work at the Arizona Proving Grounds, including 37 hourly workers represented by a local chapter of the UAW.

The UAW, which has been increasingly critical of Tavares and such layoffs, did not respond for comment on the planned closure.

Stellantis, like most automakers, has several proving grounds in different climates and geographies to develop and test vehicles ahead of selling them to consumers. Stellantis’ other major U.S. proving grounds facility is a 4,000-acre campus located west of Detroit in Chelsea, Michigan.

Stellantis’ complex in Arizona was one of 18 facilities the company notified the UAW it could potentially close during the union’s contract negotiations last year with Stellantis.

A majority of the other operations were parts and distribution centers that were expected to be consolidated into “mega sites,” as well as the company’s massive 500-acre campus in metro Detroit formerly used as Chrysler’s world headquarters.

The status of the other properties was not immediately clear, however, local and state politicians, including Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, have expressed concerns that Stellantis could move to shutter the former headquarters in Auburn Hills, Michigan.

Stellantis has significantly reduced the number of its U.S. employees in recent years amid Tavares’ cost-cutting measures.

Stellantis has reduced employee head count by 15.5%, or roughly 47,500 employees, between December 2019 and the end of 2023, including a 14.5% reduction in North America, according to public filings. That doesn’t include further head count reductions and layoffs this year.

The automaker had only about 11,000 U.S. salaried employees at the end of last year. That compared with 53,000 at General Motors and 28,000 at Ford.

The reductions have occurred as Stellantis has attempted to outsource many engineering efforts to lower-cost countries such as Brazil, India and Mexico, according to several people familiar with the moves.

Bloomberg News earlier this year reported that Stellantis moved to recruiting a majority of its engineering workforce in those countries, where the cost per employee amounts to roughly €50,000 ($53,000) or less per year — far less than similar positions in the U.S. and Europe.

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They Were Loyal Republicans — Until Trump and Abortion Bans https://thenewshub.in/2024/10/11/they-were-loyal-republicans-until-trump-and-abortion-bans/ https://thenewshub.in/2024/10/11/they-were-loyal-republicans-until-trump-and-abortion-bans/?noamp=mobile#respond Fri, 11 Oct 2024 09:02:03 +0000 https://thenewshub.in/2024/10/11/they-were-loyal-republicans-until-trump-and-abortion-bans/

“I consider myself an original Republican. We used to refer to Biden and Kamala in our house as the ‘corpse and the cackler.’” “I am a lifelong Republican — of smaller government, lower taxes, not intervening in our lives.” “I grew up in the Reagan era, and Reagan was a hero in my home. So he was my hero.” “I think in this day and age, you really can’t say that if someone is pro-choice, they must be liberal.” Abortion is changing the Republican Party this election. Here in Arizona, almost one-third of Republicans say they’ll support Proposition 139, a state ballot measure that would make abortion legal until about 24 weeks. “I would say 20 years ago, that definitely would not have been the case.” We spoke to three longtime supporters of the Republican Party about how the end of Roe v. Wade is changing their vote. “I grew up very Catholic. I never knew anybody who had an abortion. I don’t think I said the word out loud until after I’d been married.” “When I heard about Roe being overturned, I was not terribly surprised. Our state law reverted back to the previous law, which was from 1864.” “No one could quite believe it. I mean, it really came so quickly.” Passed during the Civil War when Arizona was still a territory, the 1864 law was a near-total ban on abortion. “Even conservatives in Arizona thought that it didn’t make a lot of sense.” The law was overturned in May, and a ban after 15 weeks was put into place. But it made some Arizonans rethink their stance on abortion. “I had to stop and think: Well, how do I feel about it? What could the potential repercussions be? And the more I read, the more news stories I saw, the more afraid I got for women. I’m a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I am a mother of 10 and a grandmother. I do believe in the sanctity of life, but I just don’t believe it’s my right to choose for someone else.” “I think when people go through this, it is probably the most painful decision they’ve ever made. I was a delegate to the 2016 convention, and the day that we had the vote in Arizona to go to the convention, I realized that I was bleeding. Turns out that I somehow was pregnant and it had released. I went to the doctor, and I had to have a D&C. Let’s say the 1864 law was in place. Would they have allowed me to have a D&C? Would they have investigated me? 2016, I voted for Trump; in 2020, voted for Trump, but I won’t vote for him again.” “President Trump prides himself in the fact that he dismantled Roe v. Wade. It doesn’t serve women well. It doesn’t serve the country well. And so I can’t support and would say to friends of mine, if Prop 139 is your issue, I don’t see how you could support candidate Trump.” “I will always be a Republican. I listen to NPR in the morning, it reminds me every day why I’m a Republican, but I can’t see myself voting for either of them, for either party at this point.” “I will be voting for Kamala Harris. I have done phone banking on one occasion and I’ll be doing it again. This time, I think that a lot of Arizonans feel, and I feel like our vote actually counts.”

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