Soglin: If Oscar Mayer Leaves, Someone Else Needs To Take Over Plant

Madison Mayor Paul Soglin says the city has two options for dealing with the Oscar Mayer plant: Convince executives to keep the plant open, or find another company to take over the site.

Soglin announced last Tuesday that Oscar Mayer would be closing its plant and corporate headquarters on Madison’s north side by early 2017. Should those plans move forward, it’s expected that about 1,000 jobs would be lost.

Keeping Oscar Mayer in town is Soglin’s main goal, he said Monday. However, the company has turned down requests from both local and state government officials to meet.

Soglin said that if officials aren’t able to make the case for keeping the company in Madison, someone else would ideally move into the facility. He said the city has invested millions of dollars into providing water and waste disposal to the plant.

“It would be a shame if that cannot be recaptured and utilized by a subsequent user,” he said.

Rather than converting the plant into office spaces, Soglin said the ideal user would be another large-scale manufacturer.

Even if Soglin convinces Oscar Mayer to stay in Madison, there’s no guarantee employees wouldn’t be laid off: In Davenport, Iowa, where the company is expanding a manufacturing facility, nearly 800 workers are losing their jobs.