Can We Save The Cannery?
By Dave Rosenberg
Yolo County Supervisor, District Four
Surprise. That's the only word that can adequately describe the recent announcement that Con-Agra (the parent company of Hunt-Wesson) was planning to close the Davis Hunt-Wesson Processing Plant in the Fall of 2000, along with numerous other plants around the country, as part of a corporate restructuring.
The Cannery, as it is known in the community of Davis, has been a fixture in the northeast part of town for almost four decades. An entire generation of Davisites has grown up with the cannery. Many have worked there in the summers.
The statistics are well-known. The cannery employs over 200 people full-time, many of whom live in Davis. Seasonal, part-time employees number in the hundreds every year. The cannery sits on a 100-acre site, and operates out of a building which is 550,000 sq. ft. About 300,000 tons of tomatoes are processed each year into spaghetti sauces, tomato sauce and tomato paste and other tomato creations. It is estimated that each year some $20 million of product is moved through that plant.
Why is this important to Davis and Yolo County? Let me count the ways. Tomatoes are the number one agricultural product produced in Yolo County. Farmers need a local plant to process their goods or face increasing costs of transportation. Davis and Yolo County pride themselves on their agricultural heritage and the quest to preserve farmland. A processing plant is a critically important component of a strong agricultural economy. And how about the jobs lost and the people who are affected? These are real people with real families who will be impacted by this closure. Finally, the ripple effect of this closure will be felt throughout Davis and the Yolo County economy. Every job lost has impacts. It means fewer people earning money which can be spent in the economy. The closure of a business of this size will have an immediate and long-term negative impact on Davis and the Yolo County economy.
Can we do something about it? You bet we can.
The"good news" (if it can be called that) is the announcement by Con-Agra that the closure will not occur until the last quarter of 2000. We, as a community, have been given 18 months to make our case and to plan for the future. We should seize the moment, and we will.
I have suggested at least two, if not three, options which may be available to us: (1) Plan A is to convince Con-Agra to re-think its decision, and invest the funds to continue this viable plant in Davis. (2) Plan B is to find another processor to take over the operation, perhaps a farmers' cooperative or a workers'/farmers' cooperative. Failing this, we should work collectively to find an alternative, appropriate use for this site that will provide a net benefit to agriculture.
Do these options have any hope for success? I believe that they do.
The Sacramento Area Commerce and Trade Organization (SACTO), clearly recognizing the importance of this cannery to the local and regional economy, has already stepped forward and offered to pay for the cost of sending a local delegation to Omaha to meet with the key decision-makers from Con-Agra. I believe such a trip may be beneficial. Con-Agra needs to hear from a united community on this subject. And in light of the fact that Japan just lifted its tariffs on tomato products (which some analysts believe will double the value of tomatoes) there may be cause for Con-Agra to rethink its decision.
Failing that, we have enormous resources in this community, particularly on the UC campus, to assist us, the agricultural community and organized labor to explore the possibility of another user or a cooperative coming into the community to operate this plant. More and more processing plants are being run by cooperatives. They don't need to make a "profit," they just operate the plant for the benefit of the growers.
Within days after the announced closure, I submitted this matter to the Yolo County Board of Supervisors. I proposed that it be referred to the Yolo County Economic Development Council (EDC), which I chair. The Board agreed. At the very next meeting of the EDC, I placed the matter on the agenda, and referred the issue to the EDC's Agriculture Advancement Committee, chaired by a farmer, Dona Mast, recently selected as Agricultural Businesswoman of the Year in Yolo County. Five business days later I appeared at a meeting of the Davis City Council and offered the good offices of the EDC to work with councilmembers, staff or a task force assigned by the City Council toward the goal of keeping the Cannery in operation either through the current operator, or a new operator. Failing that, I suggested that we work together to determine another appropriate use for the site. In my mind, that’s an agricultural use.
This community prides itself on preserving and enhancing agriculture. We now have an opportunity to work together to advance that goal by achieving a specific objective: Save the Cannery.