Layoffs At Verizon Business In Tulsa

TULSA, Okla. (AP) -- Verizon Communications began laying off staff in Tulsa Friday as part of a companywide cut in employment.<br/><br/>The company declined to disclose how many people from its Tulsa-area

Friday, July 14th 2006, 10:12 am

By: News On 6

TULSA, Okla. (AP) -- Verizon Communications began laying off staff in Tulsa Friday as part of a companywide cut in employment.

The company declined to disclose how many people from its Tulsa-area workforce received notice on Friday. Verizon employed about 1,600 in Tulsa, officials said.

"Today's reduction is part of the company's previously announced plan to reduce the Verizon Business workforce by 7,000 over three years," spokeswoman Lynn Staggs said. "The reduction is coupled with certain structural and organizational changes that will improve the company's speed to market and cost structure."

Several locations around the country faced cuts on Friday, Staggs said. The company employs about 30,000 nationwide, she said.

"We are offering job counseling at these locations," Staggs said.

Most Oklahoma employees of Verizon, a New York-based telecommunications company, work at the Cherokee Industrial Park in Tulsa.

Friday's announcement was the latest problem for Tulsa's former WorldCom operation.

The stagnant Verizon workforce in the state has twice drawn regulatory attention. Earlier this year, the company paid $560,000 in fines to Oklahoma for its failure to create 160 jobs in the past year.

At the end of 2005, the company employed 1,763, or about 200 less than two years ago, according to the Oklahoma Department of Commerce. The company was fined $280,000 in March 2005 for failing to create jobs in 2004.

The penalties for failure to create jobs were worked out more than two years ago in an agreement between Oklahoma Attorney General Drew Edmondson and MCI Inc., the Ashburn, Va.-based telecommunications company that Verizon acquired in January.

Edmondson filed 15 criminal charges against WorldCom, MCI's predecessor company, and six of its executives in August 2003. Oklahoma was the first state to pursue criminal charges against WorldCom, which collapsed in July 2002.

The $11 billion scandal that led to the collapse cost investors an estimated $180 billion.