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Boeing jobs in state finally increase a bit

By Dominic Gates
Seattle Times aerospace reporter

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Jobs figures updated by the company Friday show that Boeing gained 43 employees here. That's the first monthly increase for the company's Washington work force since August 2001, just before the 9-11 attacks.

While there's no guarantee the employment trend will continue upward, the chances look good for modest job gains ahead: Boeing expects stability on the commercial side of its business here, and on the defense side, it's hiring.

"It's the beginning," said Machinists union district President Mark Blondin. "We've seen the worst of things. It's been a long few years; it's good to see we've reached the end of it."

Five members of Blondin's International Association of Machinists (IAM) were laid off in June. But 39 formerly laid-off IAM members were recalled to work as the company filled different skill needs.

Blondin said he expects commercial-jet-production rates to increase and hiring to pick up next year. "The position of the company is looking good," he said. "We're optimistic going into '05."

Charles Bofferding, executive director of the white-collar Society of Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace (SPEEA), is also confident that Boeing has reached bottom.

Bofferding said that when the company announced the sale last week of its commercial-electronics unit to BAE Systems, it committed to providing replacement jobs for about 200 local engineers who will lose their positions after a transition period.

"It's an indication that they are rebounding when they feel comfortable making that commitment to employment seven months out from now," Bofferding said.

In June, four SPEEA members were laid off while eight were recalled to work from layoffs.

Boeing representatives yesterday were unable to pin down exactly where within the company the new jobs in the state had been added.

The commercial-airplane division — based here with other units in Wichita, Kan., and Long Beach, Calif. — lost 200 jobs nationwide last month. The company's defense division lost almost as many.

However, those national figures include the impact of a reorganization that shifted some human-resources and information-technology employees from the commercial and defense units to a companywide division called Shared Services.

Boeing's Puget Sound defense unit has been doing well with high-tech-systems projects, including work on the F/A-22 fighter program and the recently-won contract for Navy anti-submarine aircraft.

"Definitely some of those (added) jobs are on the defense side," spokesman Chick Ramey said.

Boeing is advertising 118 open positions in the state, most of them for high-level engineering jobs in the defense and research areas. Company spokeswoman Barbara Murphy said the company is hunting for high-end technical workers in those areas and facing a very competitive market.

Within a month of the 9-11 attacks, Boeing began massive layoffs as it became clear that the civil airline industry was reeling. From a peak of 80,000 in Washington that August, Boeing had shed 27,237 jobs before the tiny recovery in June.

Nationwide, Boeing gained 117 jobs last month.

Dominic Gates: 206-464-2963 or dgates@seattletimes.com

Copyright © 2004 The Seattle Times Company

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