Avondale Mills, Inc.’s manager of corporate development said Wednesday that the Tifton denim manufacturing plant is definitely on the company’s closure list. Local economic developers described the company as “good corporate citizens.”

Stephen Felker Jr. said he is upset about the closure and wants to honor all the company’s obligations to lenders, bond holders and associates. The Tifton plant employs between 100 and 120 employees who have been notified of the closure.

“It really upsets me,” Felker said. “My father is my CEO and I’m the fifth generation to work in this company.

“I’ll be out of a job as well. It will be tough.”

Felker said that the company wanted to make the announcement early out of respect for employees who are losing their jobs.

“We will be here for them through July 25,” Felker said.

Some plants could be saved by restructuring. Others may be sold or liquidated, Felker said. Felker said the chance that the Tifton plant could be sold as an operating unit is nonexistent.

Felker said the retirement benefits for Tifton employees were secure.

“We have what is called a defined contribution plan that is fully funded and fully mobile with our associates,” Felker said. “They get to take it with them.

“We want to exit this business gracefully and honestly.”

The company announced earlier this week that it would close or sell all its plants in three states. The Monroe-based textile manufacturer reached a $215 million settlement with its insurance company for damages caused by a 2005 Norfolk Southern train derailment and fatal chemical spill in Graniteville, S.C. Nine people were killed in the spill, hundreds were hospitalized and thousands were evacuated from a one-mile radius around the accident site. The company said another $100 million of the settlement will be paid today.

“We do not believe that the settlement fully compensates us for the full value of the losses incurred as a result of the Norfolk Southern derailment,” company Chairman G. Stephen Felker said in a news release.

Felker said the company intends to pursue a lawsuit or seek a settlement against Norfolk Southern.

Avondale Mills received a $200,000 OneGeorgia grant to help renovate the plant after a March 2002 fire.

Earl Denham, president of the Tifton-Tift County Chamber of Commerce, said the plant has been in Tifton as long as he can remember.

“They have been good corporate citizens,” Denham said. “We are saddened by the closure and we will work with Avondale to assist them and assist the employees, if possible, to find other companies who might want to hire them.”



Information from an Associated Press story was used in this article.



To contact city editor Angie Thompson, call 382-4321.