By Jason Stuart
Ranger-Review Staff Writer
The local economy took a big blow on Wednesday as BNSF Railway announced significant job cuts at its Glendive operation.
BNSF spokesman Ross Lane confirmed the company cut 55 positions in Glendive. All of those employees — including five supervisors — worked in the Glendive diesel shop, which conducts repairs on the company’s locomotives.
Unlike previous layoffs, when BNSF employees were “furloughed,” these job cuts are permanent, Lane confirmed, though he did add that those affected would be given the opportunity to pursue other vacant positions at other BNSF locations or be offered early retirement if they qualify.
“Yesterday, BNSF informed employees in Glendive about the difficult decision to permanently eliminate 55 mechanical jobs at the diesel shop facility,” Lane said. “BNSF is working closely with employees impacted by the change to offer positions where vacancies exist across the BNSF system. Scheduled employees may also choose to exercise seniority per their union negotiated agreements.”
Wednesday’s announcement marks yet another turn in the continuing decline of BNSF’s workforce in Glendive. Less than three years ago in October 2014, at the height of the Bakken oil boom, a BNSF executive told a crowd at Dawson Community College that the company was looking to add “probably ... another 500 people, and most of those will likely be in Eastern Montana.”
Since then, however, the company has gone in the opposite direction as the oil boom busted and the demand for the shipment of other major commodities like coal precipitously declined. Instead of adding employees as they said in 2014, the company has been shedding them. This marks the third straight year that BNSF has laid off or transferred employees from its Glendive operation.
Lane said the reasons behind that are both due to the downturn in rail freight demand and greater efficiencies within the rail system itself.
“Unfortunately, long-term trends in customer demand continue to negatively impact traffic volume in certain business segments, particularly for coal and petroleum products. BNSF does not anticipate coal returning to peak levels and handled 480,000 fewer units of coal year-over-year in 2016,” Lane said. “Additionally, record capital investment has resulted in more efficient and capable operations across the northern corridor. Consequently, BNSF has had to adjust its workforce needs to match declining freight volume and operational efficiencies in certain locations.”
Glendive is the only BNSF operation in Montana affected by this week’s cuts. The only other affected location in the system is the company’s Murray Yard in Missouri, which is having all of its mechanical work shifted to another BNSF rail yard in Kansas.
The news of the BNSF job cuts brought immediate reaction and concern from local community leaders.
The timing of the news potentially could not have been worse for Glendive Public Schools, which is in the middle of running a mill levy election to try to keep its increasingly shaky budget held together.
Superintendent Ross Farber said school officials are concerned that the news of the BNSF job cuts may affect how people vote on the mill levies, as well as how it might impact school enrollment, which dictates how much funding the school district receives from the state. However, he added that past rounds of BNSF job losses have not affected the district as much as had been feared.
“Of course we’re concerned about it,” Farber said. “It’s a concern to us, but we won’t know the total impact until it actually shakes out. We’ve been told this before and then the impact was very little.”
Dawson Community College President Scott Mickelsen said the college stands ready and willing to do all it can to help those BNSF employees affected by the layoffs.
Mickelsen said college officials are looking to help in a variety of ways. He said the college is working to organize a career fair “as early as next week” as one way to begin trying to help. He added DCC is also looking to partner with the Glendive Job Service and help any former BNSF employees get any training or certificates they may need to pursue a different job.
“We just want to do everything we can do to try to help these families holistically,” Mickelsen said.
For Christine Whitlatch, director of the Glendive Chamber of Commerce, and Craig Anderson, interim director of the Dawson County Economic Development Council, the news of the BNSF cuts is another indication of how Glendive needs to try to begin diversifying its economy more, and both said they hope this news acts as a catalyst to galvanize the community to do so.
“Just as the community came together to support DCC, we need to come together to discuss broader economic development opportunities to strengthen employment in Eastern Montana,” Whitlatch said.
“Good paying jobs are the lifeblood of a community, and the community college is under financial stress and the railroad layoffs are serious as a heart attack,” Anderson said. “Now more than ever, the community needs a laser focus on economic development.”
Reach Jason Stuart at rrreporter@rangerreview.com.