Appliance Firm to Close Plant, Lay Off 500 (Emerson) [View All]

[Snellius]

SPARTA, Tenn. April 7 — Nearly 500 people will lose their jobs as Emerson Appliance Controls, the town's largest employer, closes its plant by June 2005, officials said.

The 492 jobs will be phased out starting in a few months, company spokesman Dave Baldridge said Tuesday. Competition forced the company to close the plant, and future work will be done at other plants in the United States and in Asia, he said.

"It hurts. It's like a dagger in the heart," Sparta Chamber of Commerce president Wallace Austin said.

http://abcnews.go.com/wire/US/ap20040407_1345.html