More Than 500 Layoffs Coming to Butler County, Ohio

Few rust belt states other than maybe Michigan and Illinois have lost more jobs in recent years than the Buckeye State. And the hits just keep right on coming, as reported last week by the Middletown Journal:

More than 500 people in Butler County could be laid off by company closings between now and March.

The latest layoff notices are from Diversapack of Monroe and Xanterra Parks & Resorts Inc., which manages Hueston Woods Lodge and Conference Center in College Corner.

Diversapack, a manufacturing company, will close on or around March 5, and cut jobs for approximately 173 employees, according to a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act notice received Jan. 6 by Ohio Department of Job and Family Services. As of Feb. 7, Xanterra will no longer manage Hueston Woods, terminating 93 jobs effective that date or during the 14 days after, according to its WARN letter to the state.

Those losses add to the closing Friday of Mohawk Fine Papers’ mill in Hamilton, which has 137 jobs, and the potential closing of SMART Papers, which started employee layoffs in December.

SMART had more than 200 employees when it announced last October it was ceasing its operations. It told the state 46 would be laid off in December, with other rounds this month and February.

All in all, it's been a bad year for Butler County:

The notices of mass layoffs from Diversapack and Xanterra are the first in Ohio for 2012. Last year, mass job loss announcements in Butler County totaled about 800, including Mohawk and SMART, one of the highest numbers in the state. Butler County business closings and downsizings in 2011 also included Kmart, MISA Metals, BAE Systems and CEVA Logistics US Inc.

But all is not lost. With 7,000 new Dunkin' Donuts being opened around the country, I'm sure one or two will be built in Butler County to take up the slack.


Bonus: remember way back when rock stars actually used to get ANGRY?