East Moline, Future Hog Slaughtering Capital of the World


D. VanThournout
12-07-05

Well... it looks like the Quad Cities is in the process of redefining itself yet again. We are, through the good graces of Mayor Thodos of East Moline, gaining the "dis-stink-shun" of having the worlds largest hog slaughter house built in our backyard... and some people's front yards...

... All for a few jobs. A thousand of them in fact.

Triumph Foods is proposing to build the world's largest hog slaughtering facility on 116 acres nestled in the corner of I-88 and Barstow Road. This area is also noted to be flood prone.

These new jobs are purportedly going to be paying an average of $11.75 per hour. Now I'm not really that great at math but... I know that you can have a bunch of $9.00 per hour or even $7.50 per hour jobs and still come out with an average that rides around $11.75 per hour. You just have to weight it a little financially at the top of the organization. One citizen asked about this requesting what the base wage was going to be. Mr. Hoffman suggested that the actual starting wage would really be about $11.75 an hour! Which I might point out is simply impossible. And deceptive on Mr. Hoffman's part as well.

At the East Moline City Council meeting on Monday Dec. 5th there were about five or six (probably being generous) that were in favor of allowing Triumph Foods into our community while about 30 citizens spoke against the idea.

Interestingly, Mr. Hoffman and the other attending Representatives of Triumph Foods waited in another room during the bulk of the citizens comments.

Next Meeting is on Dec. 19th. The council will vote on the issue at that meeting.

Numerous drawbacks were mentioned by concerned citizens including:

When, (not if but When) it floods, that area and the people residing there will be exposed to hazardous pollution including possibly deadly diseases that are able to cross over into the human population.

One former IBP employee of seven years simply said, "I forbid my family to work there."

To see a description of the kind of jobs East Moline City Council would like to bring to the Quad Cities See; www.hfa.org

Triump Foods is a newly formed LLC. In hawking their "vision" to the city council they referred to an incident which occurred at the tail end of building a similar facility in St. Joseph, MO. An accident, an interruption, but he did not mention that someone had died. Yes the work place can be dangerous... in fact, slaughterhouses are 2 to 3 times more dangerous than the average work place. The turn over rate in employment at such facilities averages an astonishing 80 to 100% annually.

Migrant workers are typically hired for this particularly nasty, low wage job. This naturally has the tendency of ensuring a more "agreeable" work force (since they feel they cannot raise their voice if they feel they've been unreasonably exploited for fear of being fired).

Mr. Hoffman assured the city council that there would be no odor from the facility. A claim I find difficult to believe since the plant plans on slaughtering 1000 hogs an hour. I noticed that the hog confinement building has numerous windows. I assume that this building is also at negative air pressure? Incidentally, while Mr. Hoffman seems fond of tossing high tech terms around such as negative air pressure... hospitals use these high tech disease prevention measures too... they also have some of the most deadly microbes haunting their halls.

It seems unrealistic in the extreme that Triumph Foods, a young new start up company will be changing any of the current trends in slaughter house statistics. More dangerous, more polluting, and more migrant it will likely remain.

In recent years the Quad Cities has attempted to remake itself as a tourist friendly destination. I wonder how Quadcitians feel about our new image?

Quite possibly the true costs of allowing Triumph Foods to locate their facility in East Moline, potential environmental degradation, increased health care costs, devaluation of real estate, and overloading of our municipal services will far exceed the short term profits of 1000 fairly notoriously bad jobs.

Besides all that, I feel compelled to point out that regardless of where the hogs are being confined (in what they call Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations), they are destroying someones quality of life somewhere.

Mr. Hoffman touted Triumph Foods as a "high tech" company. In reality this type of an operation through an assembly line approach, takes a skilled job such as meat cutter and reduces it to an unskilled position. Additionally,Triumph Foods has expressed their intention of going beyond even IBP in providing a more completely "finished" product. Traditionally, meat processing plants produce a finished product which requires further processing, employing various butcher shops run by professional meat cutters who provide end use customers with their preferred cuts of meat. In other words, if there are still a few meat cutters out there they may find themselves out of a job once the new Triumph Foods hog slaughter house is built. Trading a lot of higher paying jobs in the Ag sector (family farmers) and among meat cutters for a bunch of dangerous, low wage jobs doesn't sound like progress to me.

One citizen felt that it was clearly a lack of imagination on the part of the city administrator. He thought that the Mayor should do better by the fine citizens of East Moline than selling them off to Triumph Foods! People deserve a better future than this. He suggested encouraging a manufacturer making wind generators to reside in East Moline.

When I was a kid they told me that Moline was the farm implement capital of the world... Now we're changing our image a little...

I realize that this area needs jobs but this is factory farming and big business and pollution and not in the long term sustainable.

Mayor Thodos, the Quad Cities deserves better!


D. VanThournout

The author may be contacted by email at dave at oneskygate dot net

You may contact the East Moline City Council at the following phone numbers;

MAYOR John Thodos -- 752-1599

Ald Helen Heiland, 1st Ward: For
(Not Opposed to any Business)

TeL: 755-0578

Ald Luis Puentes, 2nd Ward: For
(Supports Development that brings jobs to the area)

TeL: 269-8650

Ald Luis Moreno, 3rd Ward: Against
(he worked in a Hog Plant)

TeL: 752-9041

Ald Carol Doose, 4th Ward:
(Sounds Like Leaning) Against (says she has a bad feeling & people would have to sell her on it)

TeL: 752-0025

Ald Rick Meredith, 5th Ward: Apparently For
(but has concerns about Low Income Housing for the Residents who work there)

TeL: 236-7646

Ald Gary Kelley, 6th Ward: Undecided
(he preferred No Comment on his General Opinion of Hog Plants)

TeL: 755-9530

Ald Gary Westbrook, 7th Ward: Undecided
(he said he has no 1st Hand Knowledge about Hog Plants)

TeL: 755-7881

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