MEMPHIS — It’s uncommon for a Black neighborhood to notch a win in opposition to a big industrial polluter, however that’s what occurred on this metropolis’s south aspect.
Tennessee
The TVA is dumping a mountain of coal ash in Black south Memphis
A convoy is trucking the contaminant by way of a neighborhood already burdened with air pollution to dump it in a landfill
But it surely didn’t final lengthy.
Simply two weeks after Valero Vitality Corp. and Plains All-American deserted their pipeline bid, the Tennessee Valley Authority introduced its plan to truck thousands and thousands of tons of contaminated coal ash by way of south Memphis for almost 10 years and dump it in a landfill there. And there was nothing residents might do to cease it.
What occurred in south Memphis is one other instance of how industries continually work to combat their approach into communities of coloration already teeming with air pollution — and get their approach as a rule.
By spring this 12 months, earthmovers have been crawling on a mountain of the poisonous pollutant and dumping it into vans with sealed cabins to guard the drivers in opposition to respiratory it. Each weekday, the convoy rolls towards Interstate 55, beginning a 19-mile procession to dump waste laced with mercury, arsenic and different contaminants at a landfill in south Memphis and canopy it with grime.
Diesel vans operated by a contractor, Republic Companies, will make 240 journeys per day to take away 3.2 million cubic yards of coal ash — about 4 million tons — by way of an environmental justice neighborhood that already faces heavy industrial air pollution from close by oil and gasoline refineries, pipelines, freeways, rail yards and trash dumps.
Residents, conservationists and native politicians who oppose the plan say that the TVA — the nation’s largest public utility — didn’t seek the advice of them adequately or significantly contemplate much less dangerous options.
In south Memphis, the coal ash convoy joins at the very least 22 different critical polluting industries, in keeping with a College of Memphis research, making a layering impact that has already led to a lot worse air high quality and well being outcomes than in a lot of the nation.
A pure gasoline plant has additionally not too long ago joined the neighborhood, and there’s a push to make the neighborhood’s victory over the pipeline short-lived.
The layering of commercial air pollution in Black, Indigenous and Latino communities throughout the nation is pervasive. And up to date research present that destructive well being outcomes in these areas are straight linked to the ways in which native governments and monetary establishments adopted insurance policies — often known as redlining — that saved individuals of coloration confined to sure areas in cities, whereas supporting Whites who relocated to suburbs.
South Memphis — damaged up into historic and iconic communities equivalent to Boxtown, Whitehaven and Westwood — already has a number of the dirtiest air in Tennessee. Measurements of ozone and particulate matter, significantly from diesel vans, are effectively above ranges thought of to be secure, in keeping with the U.S. Environmental Safety Company.
The lifetime most cancers threat is abnormally excessive, and the life expectancy fee, 67 years, is low in contrast with the state common, 75 years. The common in Shelby County, the place Memphis sits, surrounded by wealthier White suburbs, is 79 years.
“Even when the home windows are closed, I can nonetheless scent exhaust in my den,” mentioned Kimberley Davis, a 46-year-old Inner Income Service worker who lives locally of Whitehaven close to I-55.
The diesel-spewing vans will add to the greater than 2,400 automobiles that stream by her south Memphis neighborhood on the freeway daily. 1000’s extra stream throughout Interstate 240, which can be close by.
Down the highway from her home, FedEx jets take off and land around-the-clock on the world’s busiest cargo airport. Truck depots, industrial rail yards and underground industrial storage amenities all are close by.
“I used to be having points with sinuses and with respiratory, and I didn’t actually perceive why,” mentioned Davis, who runs a pair of air purifiers each time she cracks open a window. “I simply actually consider that it has lots to do with the heavy air pollution within the space.”
‘Extra hassle on prime of hassle’
Everybody agrees that the mountain of coal ash is a nightmare ready to occur.
It piled up over 5 a long time as employees burned 7,200 tons of coal per day to generate electrical energy that powered a area. The coal ash was stashed in big pits that are actually leaking and threatening to infect probably the most valuable pure sources within the Deep South: the 55 trillion gallon Memphis Sand Aquifer, the underground supply of town’s consuming water.
Memphis is the one main metropolis in the USA that pulls all of its consuming water from the bottom. A water high quality take a look at in 2017 confirmed the fears of environmentalists. It detected ranges of arsenic 300 occasions increased than the authorized restrict in a shallow physique of groundwater that sits above the deep essential aquifer.
Though research confirmed that the water is secure to drink, the TVA agreed to haul away and bury the coal ash at a value of $300 million. The utility closed the Allen Fossil Plant and labored on different plans to do away with the coal ash.
The company held public conferences concerning the proposals it was contemplating and initiated an environmental evaluation required below federal regulation. Probably the most controversial possibility was trucking coal ash by way of part of town that was greater than 80 % Black.
Because the TVA’s plan slowly unfolded, residents have been concerned in one other combat in opposition to air pollution. In 2019, two oil and gasoline firms — Valero Vitality Corp. and Plains All-American Pipeline — introduced plans to run a crude oil pipeline by way of the neighborhood.
The undertaking would have gone by way of some individuals’s backyards. Native activists who mobilized in opposition to it felt they have been combating a dropping trigger after a consultant for the oil firms made a comment that angered all of south Memphis.
At a neighborhood assembly in early 2020, a land agent contracted by the businesses defined why they chose their neighborhood: “We took, mainly, a degree of least resistance.” His remarks have been recorded and revealed on a podcast, “Damaged Floor.”
As residents reportedly stared at one another in disbelief, the land agent added: “We encountered [other] communities that have been newly being constructed, and we rerouted round them.”
Valero Vitality and Plains All-American declined a number of requests to touch upon the report. On the time, the businesses claimed that the land agent had misspoken, saying that selecting “a degree of least resistance” was by no means their intention.
But it surely was too late. The remarks strengthened neighborhood opposition. Seven months later, in October, at a second assembly with residents, a younger activist stood and used the land agent’s phrases to vilify the undertaking.
“The trail of least resistance. That’s what they name Boxtown. That’s what they name Westwood. That’s what they’re calling Memphis,” Justin Pearson, 27, mentioned, his voice booming throughout the room.
“We don’t have PhDs behind our names,” Pearson mentioned, in keeping with the podcast. “However don’t consider for a second we don’t know who we’re. We care concerning the air we breathe. We care concerning the water we drink.”
He ended by repeating the identical sentence 5 occasions: “We now have to combat now!” And at last, “This can’t stand.”
Pearson co-founded Memphis Neighborhood In opposition to the Pipeline with different neighborhood activists and finally turned its voice. The activists galvanized citywide opposition to the undertaking by exhibiting that it was a possible menace to the sand aquifer and its prized consuming water.
After the businesses dropped their plans, a photograph of Pearson exulting coated the entrance web page of a neighborhood newspaper.
The TVA’s announcement concerning the coal ash two weeks later additionally made the entrance web page. It hit many residents like a blow to the intestine.
“All people was fairly mad on the TVA” for introducing its plan and deflating residents who fought the pipeline, Pearson mentioned.
The TVA emailed a press release to The Washington Submit saying it held two public hearings in 2019 at a neighborhood heart and library to debate its plans. The assertion mentioned officers additionally met with leaders of the Sierra Membership and a bunch referred to as Shield Our Aquifer.
However the company saved its ultimate choice quiet, leaders of the environmental teams mentioned. A public data request by the Southern Environmental Regulation Middle in Tennessee confirmed that the TVA had made the choice six months earlier, in January of final 12 months, however didn’t announce it till after the pipeline combat.
“It’s not the variety of conferences however the high quality of the engagement that issues,” mentioned Amanda Garcia, the director of the Southern Environmental Regulation Middle in Tennessee.
Angela Johnson, a south Memphis resident who watched the battle over the Byhalia Pipeline, mentioned the thought of dealing with off in opposition to one other wealthy and highly effective adversary was staggering.
“Like, oh my God. Once more? Like we simply get by way of with this and right here we go once more,” Johnson mentioned. “After which, when you learn how critical it’s and who you’re up in opposition to, it actually turns into emotionally draining.”
‘I Am A Man’ and Isaac Hayes
South Memphis is wealthy with Black historical past.
Lots of the Black males who carried the well-known signal “I Am A Man” in the course of the ultimate march by the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. by way of downtown in 1968 got here from there.
The roads from downtown into the center of south Memphis led to Stax Data, the well-known music label of hitmakers Otis Redding, Isaac Hayes and Al Inexperienced, the love music crooner turned preacher.
“We now have numerous particular issues which can be, you realize, distinctive to us because it pertains to Black communities within the metropolis,” mentioned Pearl Walker, who lives in an getting old red-brick home with an enormous yard the place tall, heavy shade timber lean left and proper.
The story of Black south Memphis begins with Boxtown, established by the previously enslaved after emancipation. As with dozens of comparable settlements, industrial air pollution discovered Boxtown and Black residents.
The Allen Fossil Plant first operated by Memphis Gasoline and Mild earlier than the TVA took over within the Nineteen Sixties saturated the realm with air pollution from its smokestacks however didn’t ship energy to the houses there.
Metropolis officers made guarantees to modernize Boxtown however didn’t ship on them for many years. As Boxtown waited for a connection to the fashionable world, a narrative acquainted to just about each Black city space within the nation performed out: White flight to the suburbs with the help of favorable federal authorities dwelling mortgage loans.
As White residents moved out and Black individuals trickled into the houses they left, a lot of south Memphis was redlined, recognized as undesirable due to its racial make-up and unworthy of housing loans.
Then got here the freeways. Interstates 55 and 240 have been constructed within the mid-century. The airport underwent a serious enlargement, as did the Memphis oil and gasoline refinery. FedEx, began within the early Nineteen Seventies, remodeled the airport, bringing wealthy tax income and jobs — and much more air pollution.
In keeping with the 2013 College of Memphis research, air air pollution “concentrations in southwest Memphis have been just like and even increased than the ninetieth or ninety fifth percentile” when put next with concentrations in different polluted cities equivalent to Baltimore and Pittsburgh.
“Southwest Memphis is …, subsequently, among the many prime air air pollution areas nationwide, and its air air pollution is much more pronounced on condition that ambient ranges of air toxics have been lowering nationally over the past twenty years,” the research mentioned.
Regardless of that, Davis noticed a house in a vibrant Black neighborhood and grabbed it a 12 months in the past.
“I really like this metropolis. I really like the individuals of this metropolis, and I needed to be one in every of its residents,” Davis mentioned.
However when her throat harm and she or he began studying about air pollution by way of activist teams, Davis figured that her well being was way more necessary than historical past and the trimmings of a middle-class district.
“There was one thing unsuitable that sure areas appeared to endure from poisonous overload or environmental injustice or excessive air pollution,” she mentioned.
The TVA says the 19-mile route from the facility plant to the landfill passes 72 companies, 39 homes and an condo advanced with 36 items, in keeping with an environmental research.
“The route largely avoids residential areas,” utilizing I-55 and a state highway.
And the plan received the endorsement of the Tennessee Division of Atmosphere and Conservation.
After the TVA’s announcement, a prime adviser at TDEC, Pat Flood, informed residents that the company was “in full settlement [with] the route that this undertaking goes.”
Flood referred to as the plan “the fitting route to go” and “the fitting factor for the residents of the state of Tennessee.”
Critics strongly disagreed, saying the TVA not solely decided that may threaten the well being of the neighborhood but additionally didn’t seek the advice of meaningfully with locals.
The environmental evaluation can be misleading, the Southern Environmental Regulation Middle mentioned, arguing that it ignores total housing subdivisions that sit behind the highway dealing with constructions the TVA recognized.
Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.) approached the utility about discovering an alternate path to a unique landfill so {that a} single Black neighborhood is just not affected for a complete decade. “Simply to place it in southwest Memphis, I don’t know,” Cohen mentioned. “That simply places extra hassle on prime of hassle.”
“There’s, you realize, a whole lot of oldsters that dwell simply inside this one stretch of the highway,” Sarah Houston, director of Shield Our Aquifer, mentioned as she trailed one of many vans alongside its route. “You go one block off the road and also you’re in neighborhoods.”
Metropolis council member Jeff Warren additionally believes the TVA’s evaluation is flawed. He efficiently pushed to approve a decision calling on the TVA’s president and board to discover a route that bypasses south Memphis, however the council can’t compel the company to comply with its suggestions.
Even the Biden administration, which is sympathetic to environmental justice communities and has the facility to affect the TVA with appointments to its board, has didn’t get the Senate to approve 4 nominees who might affect govt choices.
However, if wanted, town has a robust card to play, Warren mentioned.
For the primary time, Memphis Gasoline and Mild won’t should depend on the TVA for the combination of energy it offers town. In anticipation of the tip of its contract with the TVA, the utility requested bids to reinforce its vitality provide and can focus on them at a Sept. 1 assembly. The town, one in every of its largest prospects, might play a task within the choice.
“I’m simply saying,” Warren mentioned, “that I don’t suppose, politically, you’re going to make individuals your pal by not listening to us and never attempting to assist us out right here.”
“TVA didn’t get the memo,” Pearson mentioned, “that the Memphis that has been exploited by them for many years is just not the one we’re in now.”
And but, because the neighborhood waits to see if it may get the TVA to alter course, South Memphis seems to be dropping leverage elsewhere.
In March, two Tennessee lawmakers launched laws that sought to ban municipalities from blocking oil and gasoline infrastructure.
Inside three months, it had handed.
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CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. — Employees at a Volkswagen factory in Chattanooga, Tennessee, overwhelmingly voted to join the United Auto Workers union Friday in a historic first test of the UAW’s renewed effort to organize nonunion factories.
The union wound up getting 2,628 votes, or 73% of the ballots cast, compared with only 985 who voted no in an election run by the National Labor Relations Board.
Both sides have five business days to file objections to the election, the NLRB said. If there are none, the election will be certified and VW and the union must “begin bargaining in good faith.”
President Joe Biden, who backed the UAW and won its endorsement, said the union’s win follows major union gains across the country including actors, port workers, Teamsters members, writers and health care workers.
“Together, these union wins have helped raise wages and demonstrate once again that the middle-class built America and that unions are still building and expanding the middle class for all workers,” he said in a statement late Friday.
Twice in recent years, workers at the Chattanooga plant have rejected union membership in plantwide votes. Most recently, they handed the UAW a narrow defeat in 2019 as federal prosecutors were breaking up a bribery-and-embezzlement scandal at the union.
But this time, they voted convincingly for the UAW, which is operating under new leadership directly elected by members for the first time and basking in a successful confrontation with Detroit’s major automakers.
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The union’s pugnacious new president, Shawn Fain, was elected on a platform of cleaning up after the scandal and turning more confrontational with automakers. An emboldened Fain, backed by Biden, led the union in a series of strikes last fall against Detroit’s automakers that resulted in lucrative new contracts.
The new contracts raised union wages by a substantial one-third, arming Fain and his organizers with enticing new offers to present to workers at Volkswagen and other companies.
Next up for a union vote are workers at Mercedes factories near Tuscaloosa, Alabama, who will vote on UAW representation in May.
Worker Vicky Holloway of Chattanooga was among dozens of cheering workers celebrating at an electrical workers union hall near the VW plant. She said the overwhelming vote for the union came this time because her colleagues realized they could have better benefits and a voice in the workplace.
“Right now we have no say,” said Holloway, who has worked at the plant for 13 years and was there for the union’s previous losses. “It’s like our opinions don’t matter.”
Michael Ream, who has worked assembling vehicles at the Chattanooga plant since 2019, said he voted for the union because he was inspired by the contracts it won with Detroit automakers after going on strike last year.
In a statement, Volkswagen thanked workers for voting and said 83.5% of the 4,300 production workers cast ballots in the election.
Six Southern governors, including Tennessee’s Bill Lee, warned the workers in a joint statement this week that joining the UAW could cost them their jobs and threaten the region’s economic progress.
But the overwhelming win is a warning to nonunion manufacturers, said Marick Masters, a business professor at Wayne State University in Detroit who studies the union.
“This is going to send a powerful message to all of those companies that the UAW is knocking at the door, and if they want to remain nonunion, they’ve got to step up their game,” Masters said.
He expects other nonunion automakers to become more aggressive at the plants, and that anti-union politicians will step up their efforts to fight the union.
Shortly after the Detroit contracts were ratified, Volkswagen and other nonunion companies handed their workers big pay raises.
Last fall, Volkswagen raised production worker pay by 11%, lifting top base wages to $32.40 per hour, or just over $67,000 per year. VW said its pay exceeds the median household income for the Chattanooga area, which was $54,480 last May, according to the U.S. Labor Department.
But under the UAW contracts, top production workers at GM, for instance, now earn $36 an hour, or about $75,000 a year excluding benefits and profit sharing. By the end of the contract in 2028, top-scale GM workers would make over $89,000.
The VW plant will be the first the UAW has represented at a foreign-owned automaking plant in the South. It will not, however, be the first union auto assembly plant in the South. The UAW represents workers at two Ford assembly plants in Kentucky and two GM factories in Tennessee and Texas, as well as some heavy-truck manufacturing plants.
Also, more than three decades ago, the UAW was at a Volkswagen factory in New Stanton, Pennsylvania, east of Pittsburgh. VW closed the plant that made small cars in the late 1980s.
Krisher reported from Detroit. Associated Press journalist Chris Megerian contributed from Washington.
Donde Plowman wants state flagship universities to seize the moment and take the lead in the national conversation about higher education.
“No one is better positioned than the land-grant universities to remind people why higher education matters,” she said.
Plowman, chancellor of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, has led the state’s flagship land-grant research university since 2019. She was the guest speaker Thursday for the 2024 James F. Patterson Land-Grant University Lecture at The Ohio State University.
The lecture honors former Board of Trustees member Jim Patterson and supports his mission for a vibrant university fulfilling its land-grant mission in an ever-changing world. The lecture brings to campus a prominent figure to speak to the range of challenges facing land-grant institutions.
Plowman said the challenge universities face now is a sharp decline in confidence in higher education.
“I hear the criticisms, you hear the criticisms. It’s usually the same three things: Universities are elitist, and they’re out of touch. Degrees are unattainable. They’re unaffordable, and they’re really not worth it anyway,” she said. “We spend our time on esoteric research for academic journals instead of for the … everyday people in the states we serve.”
Plowman said despite this, land-grant universities have a chance to change the narrative because of their connection to their communities. It begins with the more than 160-year-old mission started with the Morrill Land Grant College Act of 1862 and the clear mandate of education, discovery and community engagement, she said.
Land-grant universities, often through county extension services, have built up deep and decades-long relationships and trust in the community.
“Finally, it’s a sense of pride and promise that the state’s land-grant university actually belongs to everyone. It’s the people’s university,” she said. “Ask the people in your communities what they think about higher education, and there’s a decent chance they’ll scoff at you. Ask them what they think about The Ohio State University, and they will beam at you.
“Volunteers is synonymous with Tennesseans. Buckeyes is just another word for Ohioans. That kind of identity and pride is enviable. These advantages are unique to land grants. They provide us opportunities to rise above the criticism we hear about the value of higher education.”
At Tennessee, Plowman is working to put her words into practice. She has overseen a 19% increase in enrollment, even as enrollment has dropped dramatically at many other universities. The university has also set new records in student retention, alumni giving, state support and research expenditures.
Plowman said land-grant universities need to continue to make college an affordable option for students and their families. They need to make sure students are completing their degrees and leaving with applicable skills and workforce-ready knowledge.
She said land-grant universities also lead with applied research.
“It’s how we learn about problems and then leverage our expertise and capabilities to solve them – from University of Tennessee faculty helping locate hidden graves with forensic anthropology to using AI to detect sepsis sooner,” she said.“From Ohio State, it’s faculty building better prosthetics for amputees, to developing new technology to detect wildfires. The discoveries we make improve the lives of Volunteers and Buckeyes and people everywhere.”
Land-grant universities were created by law to deliver a practical education to everyday citizens and to democratize knowledge, Plowman said. Now is the time to keep that commitment and act as leaders in higher education.
“The leadership that Ohioans need from you, Ohio State, looks different than the leadership that Tennesseans need from the University of Tennessee,” she said. “But whatever it looks like, this is the time to be ourselves, unapologetically ourselves. To respond to the criticisms … because this is the moment for land-grant universities to step up and change the narrative.”
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Tennessee Volkswagen workers to vote on union membership in test of UAW's plan to expand its ranks
DETROIT (AP) — The United Auto Workers’ ambitious drive to expand its reach to nonunion factories across the South and elsewhere faces a key test Friday night, when workers at a Volkswagen plant in Chattanooga, Tennessee, will finish voting on whether to join the union.
The UAW’s ranks in the auto industry have dwindled over the years as foreign-based companies with nonunion U.S. plants have sold increasingly more vehicles.
Twice in recent years, workers at the Chattanooga plant have rejected union membership. Most recently, they handed the UAW a narrow defeat in 2019 just as federal prosecutors were breaking up a bribery-and-embezzlement scandal at the union.
But this time, the UAW is operating under new leadership, directly elected by its members for the first time and basking in a successful confrontation with Detroit’s major automakers. The union’s pugnacious new president, Shawn Fain, was elected on a platform of cleaning up after the scandal and turning more confrontational with automakers. An emboldened Fain, backed by President Joe Biden, led the union in a series of strikes last fall against Detroit’s automakers that resulted in lucrative new contracts.
The new contracts raised union wages by a substantial one-third, arming Fain and his organizers with enticing new offers to present to workers at Volkswagen and other companies.
“I’m very confident,” said Isaac Meadows, an assembly line worker in Chattanooga who helped lead the union organizing drive at the plant. “The excitement is really high right now. We’ve put a lot of work into it, a lot of face-to-face conversations with co-workers from our volunteer committee.”
The UAW’s supporters have faced stout resistance, though, from Volkswagen, which argues that union membership isn’t necessary. The company contends that its pay levels are competitive for the Chattanooga area and that it treats its employees well. The factory’s 4,300 production workers make Atlas SUVs and the ID.4 electric vehicle at the 3.8 million-square-foot (353,353-square-meter) plant.
Six Southern governors, including Tennessee’s Bill Lee, have lined up against union membership. They warned the workers in a joint statement last week that joining the UAW could cost them their jobs and threaten the region’s economic progress.
Marick Masters, a business professor at Wayne State University in Detroit who studies the UAW, said there is a good chance that this election could bring the union a historic victory. Public opinion, Masters said, is now generally more aligned with unions than it was in the past.
To approve membership, though, the workers in Chattanooga will have to look past the warnings that joining the union, with the accompanying higher wages, would lead to job losses. Since the UAW’s new contracts were signed in the fall with General Motors, Ford and Stellantis, all three companies have cut a relatively small number of factory positions. But Ford CEO Jim Farley has said that his company will have to rethink where it builds future vehicles because of the strike.
“While the UAW’s reputation has improved as a result of new leadership and contracts, it’s still associated with a decline in the auto industry,” Masters said.
Shortly after the Detroit contracts were ratified, Volkswagen and other nonunion companies handed their workers big pay raises. Fain characterized those wage increases as the “UAW bump” and asserted that they were intended to keep the union out of the plants.
Last fall, Volkswagen raised factory pay by 11%, lifting top wages to around $29 an hour, or about $60,000 a year, excluding benefits and an attendance bonus. VW said its pay exceeds the median household income for the Chattanooga area, which was $54,480 last May, according to the U.S. Labor Department.
But under the UAW contracts, top production workers at GM, for instance, now earn $36 an hour, or about $75,000 a year excluding benefits and profit sharing, which ranged from $10,400 at Ford to $13,860 at Stellantis this year. By the end of the contract in 2028, top-scale GM workers would make over $89,000.
Zach Costello, a worker who trains new employees at the Volkswagen plant, said pay shouldn’t be benchmarked against typical wages in the Chattanooga area.
“How about we decide what we’re worth, and we get paid what we’re worth?” he asked.
VW asserts that its factories are safer than the industry average, based on data reported to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. And the company contends that it considers workers’ preferences in scheduling. It noted that it recently agreed to change the day that third-shift workers start their week so that they have Fridays and Saturdays off.
But Meadows, whose job involves preparing vehicles for the assembly line after the auto bodies are painted, said the company adds overtime or sends workers home early whenever it wants.
“People are just kind of fed up with it,” he said.
VW, he argued, doesn’t report all injuries to the government, instead often blaming pre-existing conditions that a worker might have. The union has filed complaints of unfair labor practices, including allegations that the company barred workers from discussing unions during work time and restricted the distribution of union materials.
Volkswagen said in statements that it supports the right to vote on union representation, and it denied the union’s allegations.
If the union prevails in the vote at the VW plant, it would mark the first time that the UAW has represented workers at a foreign-owned automaking plant in the South. It would not, however, be the first union auto assembly plant in the South. The UAW represents workers at two Ford assembly plants in Kentucky and two GM factories in Tennessee and Texas, as well as some heavy-truck manufacturing plants.
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