Petitions turned over to DHL

During a march Monday morning at the DHL Air Park to speak out against a planned massive elimination of jobs at the facilities, about 250 people shouted chants in unison, including these repeated passages: “What do we want? Keep the jobs! When do we want them? Now!”

The group walked from the Teamsters Local 1224 parking lot to the DHL Administration Building to deliver copies of petitions containing more than 9,300 signatures of people calling on DHL’s parent company to preserve thousands of Wilmington-based jobs.

After the group entered the lobby with the stack of petitions, ASTAR Air Cargo Capt. Joe Teuchert, a part of the Save-the-Jobs Community Coalition, said, “We’d like to talk with the most senior manager here.”

A man with DHL security said, “You got him right here,” referring to himself.

Teuchert said the group would like to present him with the petitions and wanted them forwarded to the CEO of DHL’s parent company in Germany, Frank Appel of Deutsch Post World Net.

“We’d like you folks to reconsider your options of taking this DHL/UPS deal,” Teuchert said to the security guard.

The security worker, who presumably faces a possible job loss as well, said he would be more than happy to accept the petitions and have them forwarded.

When reporters asked why a member of DHL’s management staff in Wilmington did not accept the petitions or be there to respond to the “Save the Jobs, Save Our Communities” petitions, they were told to contact the communications office of DHL Americas in Plantation, Fla.

Before leaving the building, several protest participants gave brief statements on the Deutsch Post plan to take away an immense number of jobs at the air park.

If the restructuring plan is carried out as outlined in the May 28 Deutsch Post announcement, there is expected to be a direct loss of at least 7,400 Wilmington-based jobs.

By late Monday afternoon, the number of petition signatures had grown to 9,600, said Mark Dimondstein, who is a field organizer with the American Postal Workers Union and a part of the Save-the-Jobs Community Coalition.

The majority of signatures, he said, were gathered at small businesses in the area where proprietors placed them near the cash register or other conspicuous spots.