TONAWANDA, N.Y. -- An internal investigation at the Dupont Yerkes Chemical Plant has left three members of management without jobs.
According to Gary Guralny, the president of United Steel Workers Local 6992, this all started over dozens of drawings that were made by several of those former employees. A worker found a notebook filled with the pictures in July, and while many were brushed off as juvenile, one picture depicting the plant exploding raised red flags.
The doodles came in the midst of contentious contract negotiations between management and workers.
"We had an explosion at our place in 2010 that resulted in the death of a contract worker, and a lot of our issues with the company is with contracted out work,” said Guralny.
Plant Manager, Warren Hoy, issued the following apology to its workers:
“This was an isolated incident that does not reflect the views of the Company, nor is it aligned with our core values. We have taken appropriate actions to prevent this from happening again.”
He also said in a statement to Spectrum News that the company remains committed to ongoing negotiations with its workers in the future.