67 Jobs Affected—

Pitney Bowes Closing

One Newtown Facility

By John Voket

An international mailing and shipping company with a substantial local commercial presence is closing one of its two Newtown plants. On April 7, Kevin C Connolly, Pitney Bowes vice president of global supply chain, notified the Connecticut Department of Labor’s Rapid Response Unit that the Stamford-based S&P 500 company was planning to close its 11 Edmond Road facility effective December 31.

He said in the memo that company operations were being relocated from Newtown to Whitestown, Ind. The move and plant closure will compromise 67 jobs, including all warehouse workers and IT positions that support warehouse operations.

While the Rapid Response memo indicates all those positions are being transferred to Indiana, it does not indicate how many Newtown employees will ultimately move to retain those jobs. As of April 7, 18 local staff said they will relocate.

The first wave of layoffs, to those affected, will begin June 4 or soon thereafter, Mr Connolly’s memo states.

The plant is one of two operated by the “mailstream” service provider that straddles School House Road on either side of Edmond Road just south of Interstate 84. The Newtown Bee reported in June 2007 that information was circulating among employees about possible future job cuts or closings.

At that time, Matt Broder, vice president of external communications, said employees at the Newtown facility were informed about an overall company strategy to simplify the process by which Pitney Bowes delivers products to, and receives products from, its customers.

On April 9, Mr Broder responded to reports of a plant closing with the following statement: “Pitney Bowes has decided to relocate certain US product distribution activities from Connecticut to the Midwest.”

He said the closing will allow Pitney Bowes to meet its customers’ needs faster and more efficiently.

“Regrettably, this decision affects our employees at the Newtown One site,” the brief response concludes. “Those who do not relocate to the new facility will be offered transition benefits.”

Representative DebraLee Hovey, whose district encompasses a small part of southwestern Newtown, took the opportunity to use the closing to illustrate her contention that Connecticut is one of the least business-friendly states in the nation.

“Connecticut’s standing as being antibusiness and antijob is well documented,” said Rep Hovey in a release from her Capital office. “Pitney Bowes scaling back operations in Newtown is further proof of the need to ‘change’ the mindset of the Legislature in Hartford. What is even more disturbing is the way that despite the downturn in the economy, certain legislators continue to send bills forward that would not help but cause more harm.”

Rep Hovey was referring to the Legislature’s Finance, Revenue and Bonding Committee’s recently approved HB 5844, which would place a six percent tax on “deliveries” throughout the state. The tax would apply to Federal Express and UPS deliveries, as well as grocery, newspaper, restaurant deliveries, heating fuel deliveries, furniture deliveries, flower deliveries, etc.

Pitney Bowes, a Connecticut-based manufacturer of software and hardware, provides numerous services related to documents, packaging, mailing and shipping, collectively referred to as “mailstream.” The company has approximately 35,000 employees worldwide.

The company was founded in 1920 and annual revenues now total $6.1 billion. It is one of 87 existing firms that have been members of the S&P 500 since the index opened in 1957.

In March 2007 the company made headlines after a proxy statement revealed chief executive Murray D. Martin received about $4.3 million in compensation after only being on the job for seven months.