I wish to publicly apologize for creating all of the hullabaloo this week about where the Oshkosh Corporation plans to build 165,000 postal vehicles. If we here at WHBY News had done our jobs on just a couple of days last year, all of those Next Generation Delivery Vehicles would be built in the city of Oshkosh itself–with electric motors.
One of the days where we dropped the ball was on June 21st of 2021. That was the day Oshkosh Defense announced that it was going to build all of those vehicles in Spartanburg, South Carolina. I remember getting that press release from the company. We had stories featuring comments from Jason White, then-C-E-O of the Greater Oshkosh Economic Development Corporation about his disappointment the trucks wouldn’t be made here–and his understanding that the company was making the best decision for its economic well-being.
What we should have done that day is called both of Wisconsin’s US Senators to get their reaction to the news, and to ask them if they were going to contact Oshkosh Corp officials and demand an explanation for the decision, data on production capacity in Oshkosh, and union membership numbers at their South Carolina facilities. The news must have snuck past them as well that day, because neither Ron Johnson nor Tammy Baldwin even issued official press releases expressing disappointment or support in the company.
We also should have called every Democrat thinking about running for the Senate in 2022 to get their reactions as well–and to ask if they would be publicly pressuring the company to change their minds–before work began on outfitting the facility in Spartanburg. And we should have contacted United Auto Worker leadership in Oshkosh to have them comment on the number of members sitting idly at home that summer waiting for more work to come to Oshkosh Corp so they could get back on the job. Unemployment in Wisconsin that month was 3.9%–compared to the record low of 2.8% now, so Senator Johnson may have been less inclined to say that “Wisconsin has enough jobs already.” It also would have given the reporter for the Wisconsin Examiner taking part in yesterday’s video press conference time to research his question to UAW leadership if they know of any “connection” between PACUR–the company owned by Ron Johnson’s in-laws which makes sterilized medical packaging for things like surgical scalpels and clamps–and Oshkosh Corp–which makes military vehicles, concrete mixers, span lifts, and fire trucks.
And we should have demanded that Oshkosh Corp provide to us all of the documentation on their production capacity in the city, storage options for parts and completed vehicles awaiting delivery, hiring strategies, emails pertaining to their dealings with New North, the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation, and Milwaukee 7 in the search for an already-constructed building into which those production lines could be housed–just to make sure they were telling everyone the truth that Oshkosh wouldn’t be able to support the work in an economically viable way. They being a private corporation would be under no requirement to provide all of that–but negative news stories sometimes shake things loose from the tree.
But we here at WHBY also have to face the fact that we failed to serve you the public on February 23rd of 2021. That is the day Oshkosh Corp was awarded the contract to build the NGDVs–in an order that could be worth up to $6-BILLION. That day, we should have contacted the Environmental Protection Agency to get their official reaction to the fact that Oshkosh Defense planned to build that fleet with mostly gasoline-powered, low-emission engines. This is something that obviously escaped their attention, since no one in that agency apparently was aware of the specifications until February 2nd of 2022–nearly a year after the contract was awarded. That is when the agency contacted the Biden administration to stop all work on the postal vehicles until they can all be fitted with electric drive systems.
We all know that government moves very slowly, but perhaps reporting by WHBY could have sped up the process last spring. Of course, had we been reporting on this environmental concern at that time, it would have boosted the bid challenge of Oshkosh’s rival for the contract–Workhorse Group–who submitted a bid based on the cost of producing a fully-electric fleet which the EPA (and not necessarily the Postal Service) wants. That could have caused Oshkosh to lose the contract altogether. But that is the risk you take with good reporting.
Better news stories in February of last year would have also given the experts on industrial real estate, production logistics, and employee recruitment coming out of the woodwork this week more time to offer their services to Oshkosh Corp officials. Maybe they knew of huge buildings that the aforementioned economic development groups did not know about. Or maybe the perfect building was still standing in the area–but has since been torn down to make way for more senior housing units or market-rate apartments.
So please, accept my apology for not doing a better job of “getting to the bottom of” Oshkosh Corporation’s manufacture of US Postal Service vehicles. We could have saved everyone a whole lot of grief and consternation this week.
I will just have to take solace in knowing that next week a completely different topic will become the focus of the US Senate race in Wisconsin. There will be a Supreme Court nominee to either fawn over or question her qualifications. Somebody will tweet something about parents’ role in their kids education. Or Vladimir Putin will do something close to Ukraine that sends the rest of the world into a complete panic–and the candidates’ concerns about where Oshkosh Corporation makes postal delivery vehicles will disappear.
And the funny thing is, Oshkosh Corp will build all-electric trucks if they need to in Spartanburg, South Carolina on-time and on-budget. Instead of going to hearings in Washington DC or reading hostage style statements on video conference calls with three reporters, the UAW guys in Oshkosh will finish building the Joint Light Tactical Vehicles ordered by the Pentagon and start mounting giant machine guns on Stryker armored personnel carriers as part of a nearly $1-BILLION contract the Oshkosh Defense is doing in Oshkosh. And those thousand workers not coming to Oshkosh? Based on the unemployment numbers and the hundreds of job openings available at plants making other stuff around here (and at Oshkosh Corp itself), they will apparently stay at the positions they already have.
