Ultra Poly and its impact on the town of Portland Pa. & its current and ex- employees.
The company;
Ultra Poly (UP) is a company that could have a lot of things going for it and it’s employees, but threw bad management and greed among the higher ups it continues to grind it’s self and them and the small town of Portland into the ground.
The company makes plastic resin (pellets) and uses 99% post-consumer materials. Say a company that makes plastic bottles decides half way threw a run of 1,000,000 bottles to change the color, they can send the product they have already made to Ultra Poly (UP) and have them reprocess it at a low cost. They get useable product at a fraction of the cost of new and the bottles don’t end up sitting in a landfill for years to come. Sounds like a win, win for everyone right! But every thing from household trash to medical waste finds it’s way to UP and when brought to the attention of management it is quickly and quietly disposed of in a common dumpster. There has been cases were bales of material containing used diabetic syringes, hospital scrubs have found there way into the plant.
We have found that UP put all it’s egg’s in one basket with a company called Trex there the makers of the plastic decking you see in your home improvement store, and the main reason UP was bring medical waste and trash in. So with the most senior VP ready to retire they blew off all their little customers that have loyally used their services for years. Then they pushed their machines and people to the breaking point all in the name of a dollar. After Trex pulled out they had no were to go back to only a few small customers came back alone with one or two new one’s. Now they are back to eight-hour shifts and only a hand full of people. UP’s VP’s keep getting richer as there workers get poorer and the good town of Portland becomes more polluted.
Just the facts...
Here you can find fact and things that UP does not want you to know.
Ultra Poly cares nothing about there workers or the pollutants the company continues to cause for it's workers and the town.
Workers are exposed to dangers amounts of polyvinyl chloride (pvc). http://www.greenpeace.org/international/campaigns/toxics/polyvinyl-chloride
Ultra Poly continues to refuse to buy and fit workers with respirators.
Dangers medical waste has been brought into Ultra Poly and not disposed of properly.
Employees come into work on a daily bases with the fear of loosening there job if they try to get the company to provided better working conditions.
The Production manager continues to be verbally abusive to the employees. As he continues to make cushy, pointless jobs for his friends.
The upper management continues to allow there employees to work in unsafe and unhealthy conditions as they continue to grow fatter and fatter bank accounts.
There is an inside drain in the floor just infront of the extruders anything that runs down it goes outside,oil and anything that is washed into it runs outside and into the ground.
There is a pond just infront of the plant that you can see that rainbow of oil and who knows what on top. All kinds of wildlife visit this water, water fowl, deer, birds could all be drinking from it.
Management;
Aside from them bring in and not properly disposing of medical waste UP has built an industrial park on their property and has given a lot to the township for a sewage plant. Can you say bribe? But at the rear of the property is a dead end road that is used by employees for everything from beer and drug party’s to a place to have sex. More than one person has been seen drinking or using drugs during their work shift. Employees have been seen down town at the local bar drinking on the breaks with their shift supervisor’s knowledge. And due to all the trash and food byproduct coming into the plant it is now infested with rats. How long before the hole neighborhood has rats in there homes? Management continues to ignore all of these things at the expense of its employees and the good people of Portland as the higher-ups continue to line there pockets as there workers and town continue to suffer. Their average employee drives a ten-year-old car while one of the owners tours the country in a $200,000 motor home.
The production manger,
At one time this job was done by one of the owner’s son’s. And to my understanding he did a fare job of it but for some reason anyone that cares at all about the people that work there goes away. Now the position is filled by the ex shipping and receiving supervisor whom from what i hear is verbally abusive to the employees. He is always on his soapbox saying how much rumors hurt the company but he is the one spreading them. Said more than one employee I talked with. He gives favoritism and creates jobs that don’t need to be for his friends. He badmouths anyone that complains about him and shortly there after they are dismissed. People like this seem to thrive at UP when good hard working people are driven off.
1/30/09
We are still getting reports that the production manger is still treating employees with disrespect and running the plant like a sweet shop. One employee told me when things go wrong you can bet he will blame one of us even thow it's his doing and when things go right ,take all the credit .When will UP get rid of this guy he only cares for his on well being and everyone in the plant must suffer becaues of him.One person has said to have his job threatened by the production manger, he was told if he talks to anyone or uses his cellphone on company property he would be fired.
