Union Members Protest as Razing Begins at Old Hennepin Steel Mill Site

Image courtesy of the News Tribune
The rat is going up and the mill is coming down.

Union members put up an inflated rat in Putnam County, saying non-union, mostly out-of-state workers are being brought in by Hennepin Industrial Development, LLC, the current owners of the old LTV Steel building, to raze the site, stripping the once-productive steel facility.

Bill Marino, manager of the Hennepin Industrial Development, LLC, said it was the company’s policy to do demolition themselves, using subcontractors.

“For this phase, we’re a family business, and we self perform the site preparation, and that’s the way we do it,” Marino said.

Marino doesn’t have specifics on the direction the site will take once it is completely razed, but he has hope his company will be able to return the area to prosperity.

“We’ve done this before,” Marino said. “Something that relaunches and re-births that site. We intend to do good there.”

Lance Yednock, a business representative for the Local 150 Operating Engineers, was on site to help lead the picket.

“They’re basically going to demo the whole place,” Yednock said. “From what we understand, they are going to tear down all but maybe four buildings. It’s going to be all scrapped.”


Image courtesy of Larry Eden

Yednock was on hand to picket companies including E & E Industrial Complex, owned by Dan Elberg, R & M Metal and Demolition, Iowa Metal and Recycling, August Pusatari who was once owner of United Demolitions but is now unaffiliated, according to Yednock, and R & M Metals Rigging and Demolition.

Source: News Tribune