GM Spring Hill Makes Way for New Hires

(Photo by Alan Poizner for General Motors)

General Motors is hiring locally in Spring Hill for the first time in more than 15 years. The company has now brought back everyone who left after the plant was idled in 2009.

More than 300 long-time workers scattered around the country to other GM plants, some for more than a year. Don Sowers just returned in May after a stint in Lordstown, Ohio.

“I just got to get two more years in and I can retire. So I’m hoping it stays around for two more years. Then after that, we’ll see.”

It’s been common for GM to move employees from one plant to the next. Even when Spring Hill opened in 1990, most people transferred in from other plants, says UAW Local 1853 chairman Mike Herron.

“We had a major hiring in 1996 off the street. A lot of locals were hired at that time, but we haven’t had any since that point, so this is an exciting time for us.”

Herron says GM has now begun looking outside itself for workers. However, they’re being brought in at roughly half the hourly wage of long-time employees, which has been a point of contention across the company.

Spring Hill is staffing up a new engine line and what’s called a “flex line” to build GM vehicles in high demand. The plant has also been promised a dedicated assembly line in the next few years, possibly a small car.