AC Casino Worker's Union Head Calls Labor Situation A 'Pending Catastrophe'
By David Madden
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. (CBS) - The announcement of Trump Plaza's plans to close in mid-September (see related story) is just another blow to Atlantic City's largest casino workers union.
Bob McDevitt heads up Local 54, which represents half of the 1,600 threatened workers at the Plaza. But put all those at Trump, Showboat and Revel together, and he's wondering...where are New Jersey elected officials on this one?
"Someone in Trenton, in leadership, has got to acknowledge that there is a pending catastrophe," says McDevitt. "With 7,000 people working under a warn act notice, I don't think that's ever occurred anywhere in one city in the state of New Jersey or probably anywhere else in the country."
McDevitt compares this situation to the recent threat to regional oil refineries around Philadelphia -- closings that were averted with the action of Pennsylvania officials on every level.
"From Harrisburg to Philadelphia and across the state, they did everything they could to save those jobs," he says. "And they did save those jobs. They had a plan, but the problem here is we have no plan from Trenton."
So his members and thousands of others are left to wait...and hope.
