Layoffs Possible At ANR

The trucking company issued the warning under the federal Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act, which requires 60 days' notice for such job cuts.

n official with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, which struck the firm Dec. 8, said the move signals that ANR Advance is planning to close.

NR Advance, which is based here, was formed in 1995 by the merger of Milwaukee-based Advance Transportation, and the ANR Freight System subsidiary of Coastal Corp., a Houston energy

olding company.

"Coastal has been subsidizing ANR for 10 years, and the indication that we've gotten is that Coastal had decided to shut down the company," said James A. McCall, special counsel with the

eamsters international office in Washington.

And that's why really in the bargaining the company didn't have anything to lose. They were trying to gut the contract."

But Robert Turcott, vice president and general counsel at ANR Advance, said that was "absolutely not" the case.

He said management had gone into negotiations in good faith after evaluating "what the company would need to have a fighting chance to survive."

o contract talks are now scheduled.

ANR's territory runs from Minneapolis to Houston and east as far as Buffalo, N.Y., but is concentrated in Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio and Michigan, Turcott said.

e said 90 percent of the company's competitors were nonunion firms.