They said it couldn’t be done. They said hundreds of good union jobs at Sunoco’s South Philly refinery were doomed. They were wrong.
Yesterday they unveiled a new name, a new company and a new future for the sprawling South Philly facility. Most of the site’s workers live here in Delaware County.
They held a ceremony to unveil the newly created Philadelphia Energy Solutions, the product of a joint operating agreement between Sunoco and the Carlyle Group. In the process they saved 850 jobs.
You can read the full story here.
On the front page of today’s print edition, there’s a photo that we might have captioned “The Odd Couple.” It shows Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett and United Steel Workers Local 10-1 President Jim Savage. They have not always seen eye to eye on the refinery issue. When Sunoco, under old boss Elynn Elsenhans announced they were getting out of the refinery business and selling the refineries in South Philly and Marcus Hook - and shutting them down if no owner came forward - the unions were vocal in their belief that Corbett was involved enough in seeking a buyer.
Yesterday there was no trace of that.
What there was lots of is what is possible when all sides come together to seek a common solution.
“We were dead men walking for 10 months,“ Savage said. “And now, we have a brighter future had we not been through this at all.”
As he often says, nothing is impossible.
Don’t believe it? Ask the 850 men and women who are still walking through those gates in South Philly.
Now, about that refinery in Marcus Hook....
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