With negotiations continuing Friday toward a possible new contract covering 500 food workers at Treehouse Foods Inc. plant on Pittsburgh's North Side, the United Food and Commercial Workers Union Local 325 planned to meet with its members at 2 p.m. Sunday at the Teamsters Local 249 union hall in Lawrenceville. If a tentative contract is reached, the union will conduct a vote from 5 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday at the union hall at 885 Progress St., North Side. Robert Simmons Jr., president of Local 325, which represents workers at the former H.J. Heinz plant, could not be reached for comment. Treehouse Foods, which makes private label soup and infant food at the plant, does not discuss the status of negotiations, Al Gambrel, a company spokeswoman, said yesterday. The workers have been working under terms of an extension reached in May. This is the first contract for the workers under Treehouse Foods, which bought the historic plant from Del Monte Foods Co. in March.
Plant sold
Johnstown America Corp., a subsidiary of Chicago-based FreightCar America, Inc., said Friday it sold what is known as the Shell production facility in Johnstown, to United Industrial Electro-Mechanical Services, Inc. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. Johnstown America said the Shell plant had been used sporadically in recent years. Johnstown-based United Industrial said it wants to expand its business by increasing its welding and fabrication facilities, and plans to staff the plant with an undetermined number of workers. Company officials could not be reached for comment. Hourly workers at Johnstown America Corp. are members of United Steelworkers of America Franklin Local 2635, which represents about 450 active members. FreightCar America manufactures railroad freight cars, particularly coal-carrying railcars.
PNC backs Heinz
H.J. Heinz Co. said that Pittsburgh-based PNC Financial Services Group Inc. has told the company it will vote approximately 1.4 million shares to re-elect all 12 directors of the Heinz board. Heinz management, which is trying to fend off a proxy fight by billionaire Nelson Peltz, believes PNC's support is further evidence that shareholders recognize its business momentum is accelerating with a strong and independent board, said Heinz spokesman Michael Mullen.
Health care issued eyed
Pennsylvania AFL-CIO President William George will be among a group of union leaders and state legislators who will discuss health care issues at a town hall forum from 9 to 10:15 a.m. Wednesday at the Crowne Plaza Hotel, Fort Couch Road, Mt. Lebanon. The group of speakers, including state Sen. Jim Ferlo, D-Highland Park, and state Rep. Shawn Flaherty, D-Fox Chapel, also will discuss legislation to limit the state's ability to tax and spend, commonly referred to as TABOR legislation.
BAE gets defense contract
BAE Systems of York said Tuesday it was awarded a $27.2 million contract from the Army to reset 43 Bradley A2 Operation Desert Storm vehicles being returned from Iraq. BAE Systems said work will begin immediately on disassembling the vehicles and overhauling the components at its facility in North Union near Connellsville. BAE Systems said it will install tracking mounting provisions and modify all 43 vehicles to fleet standards. Final assembly, integration and testing will be done by BAE Systems in York. The modified vehicles are to be delivered to the Army beginning in July 2007. Herb Mutkarian, a BAE spokesman, could not be reached for comment Tuesday.
Apple to miss deadline
Apple Computer Inc. on Friday reiterated that its mishandling of employee stock options will cause it to miss a regulatory deadline for filing its latest quarterly results as the iconic maker of iPod music players and Macintosh computers digs into its accounting troubles. The Cupertino, Calif.-based company warned last week that a mandatory quarterly update with the Securities and Exchange Commission would be late because management needed more time to determine if Apple's stock option grants had distorted its financial results dating back to September 2002. If the filing of the quarterly report is delayed long enough, regulators could try to delist Apple's stock from the Nasdaq Stock Market.
Kohl's hiring
Kohl's Department Stores said Friday it needs about 150 workers to staff the planned store in Monaca, which is scheduled to open in October. Kohl's said its needs include department workers, register operators, and price management, receiving, service desk, housekeeping and loss prevention workers. Job applicants can either visit its Web site at kohlscareers.com or call its hotline at 1-877-639-5645. The Wisconsin-based specialty department store plans to operate 817 stores in 45 states by the end of the year.
Hybrid cars pushed
General Motors Corp., DaimlerChrysler AG and Bayerische Motoren Werke AG will spend more than $1 billion combined to develop a gasoline-electric motor for hybrid vehicles that will compete with Toyota Motor Corp. The automakers are making their push a decade after Toyota began selling Prius cars. Toyota spent $2 billion on hybrid research in the 1990s, some company officials have said, and has since sold more than 600,000 of the gasoline-electric models. Honda Motor Co. is quadrupling production of the fuel-efficient cars in Japan.
MediaNews names Riggs
MediaNews Group and its partners named San Jose Mercury News Publisher George Riggs as president and chief executive officer of their California operation, which publishes 89 newspapers. Riggs, 60, will continue as publisher of the San Jose, Calif., paper, the company said today in an e-mailed statement. He will report to William Dean Singleton, chief executive officer of Denver-based MediaNews and head of the California Newspapers Partnership, whose owners include Gannett Co. and Stephens Media.
Resort corporation sold
Intrawest Corp., which owns the Snowshoe Mountain resort in West Virginia, announced Friday it has agreed to be purchased by private equity firm Fortress Investment Group LLC for about $1.81 billion cash. The sale is not expected to change operations at Snowshoe Mountain, resort spokeswoman Andrea Smith said. The offer also calls for Fortress to assume roughly $992 million in debt, according to an Intrawest spokesman. The acquisition of the Canadian resort operator represents the latest takeout of a public company by a private equity firm.
Other business news
• Matt Harbaugh was promoted to chief investment officer for Innovation Works, the state-funded, Pittsburgh-based agency that provides investment and business support to early-stage technology companies. Harbaugh replaces Michael Morneau, who has taken a job with H5, a start-up technology company based in San Francisco. Prior to his promotion, Harbaugh was the agency's director of external finance.
• Herr-Voss Stamco of Callery said it has been awarded a contract to supply a tension leveling line with a skin pass mill at a plant in Changshu, China. Herr-Voss, a subsidiary of Genesis Worldwide II Inc., said the company will provide engineering services, supply the mechanical and electrical equipment and help install and commission the plant. The line breaks the incoming large diameter master coils into multiple outgoing coils. Kate Davidson, a company spokeswoman, could not be reached for comment Tuesday.
• The Bloomberg Pittsburgh Index of 68 stocks fell 2.50 to 280.49.
