More than a hundred workers are out a job at a Tulsa bus plant

A Tulsa bus-maker won't need the service of 120 part-time employees. That was the news workers heard Thursday morning after their shift ended. <br/><br/>News on 6 reporter Omar Villafranca says the

Thursday, January 20th 2005, 8:37 am

By: News On 6

A Tulsa bus-maker won't need the service of 120 part-time employees. That was the news workers heard Thursday morning after their shift ended.

News on 6 reporter Omar Villafranca says the part-time workers of the graveyard shift at IC Corporation in Oklahoma were told Thursday morning that their services were no longer needed.

Key Personnel contracted out those part-time employees, a local staffing agency.

IC Corporation makes school and civilian buses in Tulsa. The plant employs more than 950 full-time workers.

IC Corporation was recently in the news because they landed a $28-million contract to make more than 300 buses to ship to Iraq. Those buses will get Iraq's Public Transportation up and running.

IC's plant manager Ed Hartung says they expected a bump in the local economy. That's why they hired the part-time workers, but an incorrect economic forecast and other factors led to the dismissal of the workers. â€œObliviously that's not an exact science. We're experiencing in the Tulsa area. Several bond issues that didn't pass and busses weren't ordered, it affects our business."

Several workers we spoke with said that IC's Arkansas plant had workers that were threatening to go on strike and they thought they were going to pick up the workload if that happened. The contract dispute at the Arkansas plant was worked out this week and they went back to work.

The plant manager said Thursday's decision had nothing to do with what happened in Arkansas.