The state is still waiting to hear how many jobs are being cut at IBM’s Essex Junction plant.
The company told officials last month that employees were being laid off and it's believed the number of jobs is in the hundreds, but the state isn’t sure and the uncertainty is prompting talk of changing the rules that require companies to inform the state of large layoffs.
IBM has done nothing wrong under state rules which require companies to inform the state within 24 hours when 25 or more employees are terminated.
Many IBM employees who were given their notice have told the state that they were given 30 days.
The 30 days is up Friday, the employees’ last day on the job. Vermont Secretary of Labor Annie Noonan says that means IBM has 24 hours to provide the state with more information.
“Essentially we would expect that sometime by the end of the day tomorrow or by the time we open doors on Monday morning for business that we’ll have the official count of the number of layoffs,” Noonan explains.
Noonan says layoffs of 25 or more employees are unusual, but when there are job cuts of that size, most companies are quick to inform the state even when employees are given longer notice.
Noonan says for IBM or any company to wait until the last minute to inform the state makes it harder to respond to layoffs and provide services to people who have lost their jobs.
“Certainly we would like to see employers, when they know, give us notification at the point that their employees have gotten their notice. It would help us to get the notice at the same time,” she says.
For that reason Noonan says she would support changing the layoff notification rule to require employers to inform the state sooner when there are significant job cuts.
The change could either be made by her department by amending the rule under rulemaking procedures or it could be initiated by the legislature.
Noonan says her department would likely make the change through rulemaking if the legislature is slow to act.
