The group, along with the United Auto Workers and the Association of Minority Suppliers and dealers held a press conference Dec. 2 at Corinthian Baptist Church in Hamtramck to convey a united message to the community about the financial crisis facing the Big Three.
The group is also calling for minority suppliers to be paid on time. “We support the loan request of the auto industry presently before Congress. The auto industry is the core of the manufacturing sector of the American economy,” said Rev. Oscar King III, president of the religious group. “One out of every 10 jobs in the U.S. economy has some connection to the auto industry.
Hundreds of thousands of households depend on the automotive industry to care for their families.”
King said many churches, charities and non-profit groups that provide desperately needed support for the poor and disadvantaged are able to do so because of “working families who make their living in the auto industry directly or through the cadre of minority suppliers.”
According to King, a Harvard trained economist, the assistance provided to the banking and insurance industry was necessary to sustain the faltering economy of the nation.
“Equally important is the loan assistance to the automotive industry,” he said. “This economy will surely collapse if the auto industry is not provided the loan assistance requested. The current crisis in the auto industry has caused great pain and suffering for those families whose income is derived from the auto industry and their minority suppliers.”
At the heart of the automotive industry’s crisis is the fate of minority suppliers and dealers. Some, according to the religious organization, have been forced out of business, others have gone for a year without pay. “Minority suppliers must be paid and they need to be paid on time. The lack of payment has created a severe hardship on Michigan families,” King said.
Federal money needs to be earmarked to save the suppliers and dealers, the group said. Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr. will speak Dec. 5 at a press briefing at the Motor City Casino & Hotel Conference Center in downtown Detroit.
Jackson, whose Rainbw/PUSH Coalition’s Automotive Project has been at the forefront highlighting the plight of African American suppliers and dealers, will be joined at the 10:30 a.m. press conference by some of them as well as other elected officials and community leaders.
“The U.S. auto industry needs the proposed bridge loan to survive. But they also need an even playing field. They cannot compete unless some structural changes are made. Our trade policies must be retooled,” Jackson said in a release issued by his Detroit office.
A report released at the council’s Tuesday meeting where King was reelected for a second term to lead the group of ministers, showed how minority suppliers and dealers are the backbone of minority business communities.
1. They train and employ hundreds of thousands of people, from hourly workers to young professionals and technicians to mature workers in second and third careers.
2. A very high percentage of their workforces, from the plan to the boardroom, are minorities and women.
3. They provide essential support for a wide network of customers, suppliers and charitable and civic activities.
4. They pay hundreds of million in taxes to federal, state and local government.
6. They represent invested capital of hundreds of millions of dollars.
7. Much of this invested capital represents the entire net worth of thousands of minority families.
8. Loss of this invested capital would cripple the entrepreneurial leadership of many minority communities.
