The Boeing Co. will shutter its defense site in Kansas by 2013 and move tanker work to Washington state, the company said Jan. 7.
Boeing met with employees in Wichita, Kan., that morning and confirmed the facility’s closure. The company had said in November it was evaluating the future of the Wichita factory due to expected cuts in U.S. military spending.
“The decision to close our Wichita facility was difficult,” Mark Bass, a vice president for Boeing’s defense division, said in a press statement on Wednesday.
Bass said Boeing decided to close Wichita “to reduce costs, increase efficiencies and drive competitiveness” in light of defense budget cuts. Boeing’s Kansas facility had been in operations since 1929.
The Chicago-based aerospace company won a $35 billion contract to supply the U.S. Air Force with aerial refueling tankers last February. Boeing will build the 767-based aircraft at its Everett facility.
The company had planned to install military applications on those tankers in Wichita. In December, however, Boeing made an agreement with the Machinists union to shift that tanker work to the Puget Sound region if Wichita were to close.
Future aircraft maintenance, modification and support work will be placed at the Boeing facility in San Antonio, Texas. Engineering work will be placed at the Boeing facility in Oklahoma City.
Boeing employs more than 2,160 workers in Wichita.
The company said it will begin shutting down the Kansas facility in the third quarter of 2012 and will finish by the end of 2013.
When Boeing was competing for the tanker contract, the company had said a tanker win would support 7,500 direct and indirect jobs in Kansas. Politicians there have said Boeing’s decision to move tanker work out of Kansas would violate the company’s trust with the public.
Boeing’s Bass said that the company will continue to have a significant impact on the Kansas economy and the health of the state’s aerospace industry.
“The company spent more than $3.2 billion with approximately 475 Kansas suppliers in 2011, spanning its commercial and defense businesses, making it the fourth-largest state in Boeing’s supplier network,” he said.
“The decision of the Boeing Co. to move tanker work to Washington is bittersweet,” Everett Mayor Ray Stephanson said in a statement. “Mayor Carl Brewer of Wichita supported my call to mayors throughout the nation to support an American-built tanker. I was grateful for his support and am saddened for the workers and families in Wichita. That said, Everett stands ready to support additional aerospace work in the Puget Sound region.”
Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback called Boeing’s announcement “disappointing” in a news conference.
“No one has worked harder for the Boeing Co. than ‘Team Kansas,’ ” Brownback said.
Brownback emphasized that Boeing’s suppliers will continue to do work in the state. The Kansas governor said he believes the state will still have a strong aerospace industry in the future but the work will focus more on commercial rather than defense business.
Sen. Jerry Moran, R-Kan., expressed outrage over Boeing’s decision in a press statement.
“A company so much a part of the Wichita community for 80 years should not make this decision lightly,” Moran said. “I strongly urge Boeing’s senior leaders to reconsider this decision that will have a devastating impact on hundreds of Kansas families.”
Michelle Dunlop: 425-339-3454; mdunlop@heraldnet.com.
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