Aaron Patterson, president of United Steelworkers of American Local 1152L, stood arm in arm with House
Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi in Washington D.C., Thursday to press the case of workers facing lay off
when Cooper-Standard closes its Bowling Green hose plant this year.
With 174 workers losing their jobs, and much of the work being transferred to a plant in Mexico,
Patterson is keenly interested in the renewal of the Trade Adjustment Assistance program, which provides
benefits to workers who lose jobs because of foreign trade. The legislation authorizing the program
expires today without congressional action.
Cooper Standard workers were served notice last week that the plant would close and layoffs could begin
as early as April 5. The company said it was operating too many factories for the amount of work it had.
It could be 18 months before all the workers are let go, Patterson said.
The trip to Washington D.C., by a couple dozen workers from the Bowling Green plant was for the
previously planned rapid-response conference. It "gave us a great opportunity to make sure that our
voices were heard," the local leader said.
Patterson joined in a press conference called by Pelosi and United Steelworkers International President
Leo Gerard to call on Congress to take action on jobs.
Patterson said he emphasized the need for Congress to act in a way that creates and sustains good-paying
jobs,.
Patterson questioned why, with 20 million Americans standing in unemployment lines, Congress would let a
program assisting unemployed workers expire, especially since U.S. Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Arizona, was holding
the bill up until he gets assurance that President Obama will back a free trade agreement with Columbia.

Workers benefits are "being held hostage," Patterson said, in order to pass another trade bill
like the ones that have already cost so many Americans their jobs.
The issue is one all Americans should care about not only workers facing unemployment like those at
Cooper-Standard, he said.
"Free trade in America is not free," he said. "It’s only free to corporations that move
our good paying jobs out of the country and bring their products back here for free."
Local workers also stated their case to representatives of Congressman Bob Latta, R-Bowling Green, and
U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio.
In the meantime, workers are considering an uncertain future. "It’s a very sensitive time, a very
difficult time, for our workers," he said.
Negotiations to determine what assistance Cooper-Standard will provide workers here have not yet been
scheduled.
Issues would include severance payments and whether workers could apply for jobs at the plant in Kentucky
where some of the work will be transferred.
Patterson said that the union’s contract does not require severance payments. "We believe the
company we work for will help us out in any way they can," he said.
In the meantime the prospects for other jobs looks bleak, he said, asking with the cost of living so
high, including gas at $3.15 a gallon, who can live on a job that pays, $9, $10, $11 a hour?