Headline News
Allied Chooses Jack Cooper Bid
At the auction that concluded Thursday, September 12, Allied selected Jack Cooper Transport as the entity with the best and highest bid. The selection of the Jack Cooper bid sets up an approval hearing by U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge Sontchi on Tuesday, September 17 and, if approved, an effective sale date of October 31, 2013.
Unlike the first auction, where Allied selected a bid from Black Diamond/Spectrum that drew vigorous challenges by multiple constituents including the Teamsters, all major parties supported the sale to Jack Cooper subject to review of the final documents.
“The Judge did the right thing in reopening the auction—there were so many holes and contingencies in the prior bid by Black Diamond/Spectrum that it clearly wasn’t in the best interests of the employees or creditors,” said Roy Gross, Director of the Teamsters Carhaul Division.
“At least now upon confirmation of the sale, we’ll have a proven operator in Jack Cooper that understands its commitments under our contract,” Gross said. “We believe awarding Allied to Jack Cooper gives our members the best job and income security. In contrast, the Teamsters Union had an extremely bad experience with Black Diamond at Performance Transportation Systems and had no reason to believe Black Diamond had our members’ best long-term interest this time around either.
“With that said, we are still analysing Jack Cooper’s latest bid to make sure our members’ interests are protected moving forward. Cooper has been focused on financial issues related to purchasing Allied and we have not yet had any detailed discussion on the impact of the sale on operational issues. After the sale is confirmed we’ll turn our attention to fully understanding the operational side of things,” Gross said.
“I’d just like to thank our Teamster Allied members for being patient and maintaining their professionalism throughout this long process. They kept Allied going through this long, contentious bankruptcy marred by the battle between lenders. If it wasn’t for these drivers, mechanics and others, Allied would have liquidated long ago. Our members should also know that Teamster leadership, under General President Jim Hoffa, provided the necessary resources and spared no expense in making sure their interests were protected—we had a great team working on this,” said Gross.
For the latest updates, visit www.teamster.org/Allied.