Ralph Nader to visit Wilmington next week

Independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader plans to visit Wilmington on Monday, Sept. 8, becoming the latest presidential hopeful to visit with employees who could lose their jobs if DHL transfers its U.S. cargo flying business away from its Wilmington air freight hub.

Save Our Jobs, a coalition of union members and community activists lobbying to keep the jobs in Wilmington, asked Nader to visit. He is to appear Monday afternoon at Wilmington College, between campaign visits to Columbus and Cincinnati, to speak and meet with employees of DHL's Wilmington air freight hub.

Republican presidential candidate John McCain visited Wilmington on Aug. 7 to meet with the local activists. His Democratic opponent, Barack Obama, met with Wilmington leaders about the DHL issue during Obama's July 11 campaign appearance in Dayton.

Tony Olson, a member of Save Our Jobs, said the coalition is encouraging the high-profile visits to keep a public focus on the issue.

DHL spokesman Jonathan Baker said Thursday, Sept. 4, that his company is not commenting on matters that involve the presidential election campaign.

DHL said on May 28 that it plans to hire United Parcel Service to handle DHL's U.S. cargo flying and sorting. UPS has said it would handle that work at its Louisville, Ky., hub. Ohio officials estimate that a switch to UPS will cost at least 8,200 jobs at DHL's Wilmington freight hub, the region's biggest employer.

Meanwhile, a planned Sept. 11 workshop arranged with the help of the U.S. Department of Commerce will focus on how other cities have coped with the loss of large employers.

The three-hour session at Wilmington College will feature federal officials and representatives from Aurora, Colo., which lost an Army hospital in a 1995 military base realignment and closure round; San Antonio, Texas, which lost Kelly Air Force Base to the 1995 BRAC closure decisions, and Greenville, Mich., a community of 8,000 which has lost a 2,700-employee Electrolux appliance factory and a 200-employee Tower Automotive plant to closings since 2006. Officials will discuss efforts by those communities to redevelop the sites of the closed facilities to create new jobs.