N.C. gets $2.4M to assist displaced auto workers - The Business Journal of the Greater Triad Area:

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million grant to the N.C. Department of Commercre to assist auto workers affected by permanent closuresand layoffs. Many of the workerse also have been previously certified as eligible for TradeeAdjustment Assistance. The TAA program provideds financial aid and retraining to workers laid off by companies that have been hurtby "This $2.4 million grant will providre these North Carolina workers with important re-employmengt services to help them find and succeed in new says U.S. Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao. The granrt will provide workers with services not covered under the TAA includingskills assessment, caree counseling and case management.
Services and benefits available to the workersz under TAAinclude job-search and relocation benefits and a health-coverages tax credit. In April, said it woulcd cut about 1,500 jobs at its truck-manufacturintg plant in the Rowan County town of The Portland, Ore.-based company, previously knowhn as Freightliner, said a drop in demand for its heavyt trucks prompted the cuts. The plant had about 2,900 workers before the layoffs. On May 12, all of the affected Daimler Trucks employees were certified as eligibles for the TAA Earlierthis month, Daimler Trucks also said its unit would eliminatw 190 jobs from its Triad-area work force of nearlyu 1,600.
Company officials blamed the weak economy for a sluml in orders for newschoolk buses. Meanwhile, Daimler Trucks is preparing to move more than 300 employeews to Fort Mill from its Portland headquarters as it opensa 150,000-square-footr sales and marketing center in July. The company is relocatintg the operation to KollDevelopment Co.'s Intellicenter building off the S.C. Highway 160 Bypass at Interstate 77. Last Daimler Trucks announced it would move the unit here to be nearedr its manufacturing operations inthe Carolinas. Those facilities include a pair of plant in Gaston County as well asthe truck-assembly plant in Rowanj County.
The company also has an optionb to buy about 400 acresalong S.C. Highway 274 in westerjn York County, which local officials hope will eventually becomd the new headquarters ofDaimler Trucks. That facility could be a part ofCrescengt Resources' planned 2,300-acre Allison Creekm development.