OPINION | REX NELSON: “The steel capital”

Full story from the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette: https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2023/oct/29/the-steel-capital/

October 29, 2023 at 1:46 a.m.

by Rex Nelson

I'm in a meeting room at the Nucor Arkansas (known locally as Nucor Hickman) steel plant in north Mississippi County. The Nucor employees gathered around the table are eager to tell their story.

Most of the media attention in recent years has centered on the south part of the county near Osceola--the 2017 opening of the $1.3 billion Big River Steel plant, the $716 million expansion of that plant in 2020, the purchase of Big River Steel by U.S. Steel, the current construction by U.S. Steel of a $3 billion mill (the largest private capital investment in Arkansas history), Hybar's plan to build a $700 million rebar plant with jobs paying an average of $140,000 a year, and billionaire Gaylon Lawrence Jr.'s transformation of the old company town of Wilson into a nationally known tourism destination.

Developments in the south part of the county are the focus of my cover story in today's Perspective section. But as Mississippi County has transformed from what was once the leading cotton-growing county in the country to what soon will be America's top steel-producing county, these Nucor employees don't want me to forget that their company came first. And Nucor has never stopped making massive investments in Arkansas.

It takes what's going on both north and south (with courthouses in Blytheville and Osceola, there long was a strong rivalry between the two parts of this sprawling county) to be the leading steel producer.

Nucor-Yamato finished its mill in 1987, kicking off a new era for this part of northeast Arkansas. Nucor Steel Arkansas began production at a nearby facility in 1992 and expanded in 1998. Nucor has spent another $1 billion on upgrades just since 2018.

A drive around this area gives one a sense of the many steel-related facilities that have sprung up along the Mississippi River. In October 2019, Nucor opened a $230 million specialty cold mill complex on its Hickman land. Meanwhile, Zekelman Industries built a tube mill adjacent to its existing Atlas Tube Mill. Majestic Steel USA added a 515,000-square-foot facility on the Hickman campus. I could go on.

Jerald Gaines, general manager of Nucor Steel Arkansas, talks about the company's culture. The Florida native came here from Texas and has fallen in love with the region's workforce. So have other Nucor managers.

"We have a great workforce," says Austin Pitzer, the controller at Nucor-Yamato. "They know how to work safely, and they know how to work as a team. Arkansas is also a good place for us because of the support we've had from all levels of government."

I'm handed a book by Illinois native Ken Iverson, who joined Nuclear Corporation of America as a vice president in 1962. When the company faced bankruptcy in 1965, the board elevated Iverson to president at age 39. Iverson, who later served on the Walmart board, focused on two businesses--fabricating joists from steel to be used in non-residential construction and making steel from recycled scrap metal. In 1972, the company's name was changed to Nucor Corp.

Iverson writes in his book "Plain Talk: Lessons From a Business Maverick": "To my eyes, two of the most fascinating sights to behold are hot metal in motion and a group of people in headlong pursuit of a shared purpose. Those images are the essence of Nucor. They convey how we turned a confused, tired old company on the brink of bankruptcy into a star player in the resurgence of American steel.

"Along the way, we did something that is probably more consequential for you: We showed that many of the so-called 'necessary evils' of life in corporate America are, in fact, not necessary. The people of Nucor stand in sharp, even defiant contrast to the status quo. We're big on informality, caring, freedom, respect, equality and the simple truth. We have little tolerance for the politics, the pettiness, the fixation on rank and status, and the insensitivity to employees' legitimate needs that people in most big companies endure as a matter of course."

Nucor is now the largest recycler of any type of material in North America. It recycles more than 20 million tons of scrap annually to produce steel that's 100 percent recyclable. The company has 31,000 employees working at more than 300 facilities in North America. Almost 2,300 of those jobs are in Arkansas. The average pay for Nucor employees tops $100,000 a year. The company had net sales of $41.5 billion last year.

Earlier this year, Forbes put Nucor on its list of the world's most admired companies and its list of the best workplaces in manufacturing and production. Nucor employees and their dependents are eligible to receive $4,000 annual scholarships to colleges and vocational schools. More than $115 million has been awarded to 25,000 children nationwide since the program's inception in 1974.

These Nucor employees are proud to tell me that Nucor uses 98 percent less water than an average steel mill. They're quick to note that Nucor steel has been used in everything from the expansion of Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium at Fayetteville to giant distribution centers being built in central Arkansas as the Little Rock area becomes a logistics hub.

They're also keenly aware that the coming lithium boom in southwest Arkansas could lead to electronic vehicle battery manufacturing facilities and EV assembly plants in Arkansas. Without revealing company secrets, they note that Nucor already is involved in supplying EV companies. They know that the combination of northeast Arkansas being a steel center and southwest Arkansas being a lithium producer portends big things for the Arkansas economy.

Sitting in the meeting with me is well-known Arkansas attorney Chuck Banks, a Mississippi County native. Banks' late father was the longest-serving Mississippi County judge. Like other officeholders in the Arkansas Delta in those days, Banks' father was a Democrat. In 1982, however, the son became a Republican and took on Democratic U.S. Rep. Bill Alexander, a man the younger Banks felt was out of touch with Arkansas.

Alexander had held the office since he replaced segregationist U.S. Rep. E.C. "Took" Gathings in January 1969. Banks lost the 1982 race, but forced Alexander to come back to Arkansas and work hard for re-election. Banks later was appointed by President Ronald Reagan as U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Arkansas.

Banks began a private practice in Little Rock and became one of the most high-profile lawyers in the state. He was chairman of an independent citizens commission established in 2015 to set salaries for the state's seven constitutional officers, its 135 legislators and its judges. Banks has now come home to work with Mississippi County Judge John Alan Nelson to help manage the growth that the steel industry has brought to this county.

He praises Nucor employees and says he wants to "help tell the story of Arkansas steel" to people across the state." Pitzer assures Banks that Nucor, through large donations to entities such as the National Cold War Center and KIPP charter school in Blytheville, is focused on improving quality of life in Mississippi County.

Quality-of-life issues will be key if the steel companies are to convince people to actually live in the county. They tend to work a four-day schedule. They share mobile homes, tiny apartments and recreational vehicles with co-workers then return home to other parts of Arkansas, Missouri, Tennessee, western Kentucky and southern Illinois on their days off.

Mississippi County's population peaked at 82,375 in 1950 when thousands of sharecroppers and tenant farmers were needed to chop cotton in the summer and pick it by hand in the fall. The rapid mechanization of agriculture after World War II sent those workers to other states in search of jobs. The county's population was down to 40,685 by the 2020 census.

That's when business and civic leaders in the county came up with "Work Here, Live Here," an initiative that pays 10 percent of a new home bought in the county by those working in the manufacturing sector as long as the home is in the $200,000 to $500,000 range. The jury is still out on how well the initiative will work.

Rex Nelson is a senior editor at the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.