An extra 700 people will be clocking into work at the Pine Bluff Arsenal next year when an incinerator fires up to destroy the arsenal’s cache of Cold War-era chemical weapons.
   
The high-paying jobs for incineration workers, along with the $80 million in federal funds pumped into Arkansas since 1989 to prepare the area in case something goes wrong during the stockpile storage and demolition, are welcome in this southeast Arkansas county where unemployment rates have been substantially higher than the national average for decades.
 
"It has benefited the local economy with the influx of folks to work on that project. Some of those folks are naturally going to purchase homes here for the duration of the incineration process," said David Matheny, president of the White Hall Chamber of Commerce. "Of course, they’ll shop here and eat here."
   
Jobs are particularly welcome in the Pine Bluff metropolitan statistical area, which recorded an 8.9 percent unemployment rate in August. The unemployment rate in Arkansas and the nation as a whole was 5.4 percent.
   
But while White Hall, Pine Bluff and other cities near the arsenal welcome the influx of jobs and cash, some are already wondering what will happen when the last rocket is drained and the contractors close up shop. It’s a question they share with people living near other stockpile sites including Anniston, Ala.; Hermiston, Ore.; Tooele, Utah; and Pueblo, Colo.
   
These communities took on the risk of chemical exposure when the munitions were buried in their soil, and the risk continues as the furnaces fire up.
   
Until 2011, when the last rockets are to be deactivated at the Pine Bluff Arsenal, no one will know for sure which was greater, the cost or the benefits.
   

SCARCE WORKERS
   
Starting wages for entry-level jobs with Washington Group International, the contractor hired by the U.S. Army to destroy the chemical weapons at the Pine Bluff Arsenal, range from $9.90 to $17.20 per hour — as much as three times what workers can hope for at the fast-food restaurants popping up along Interstate 530.
   
Still, some jobs at the arsenal are unfilled with just five months to go before incineration begins.
   
"Particularly at your higher skill levels, control room operators and such, we’re struggling to find enough people for that," said Ken Keeler, a human resources consultant for Washington Group.
   
Of the people hired to work on incineration at the arsenal, roughly half are local, and half have come in from other places, said Chris West, a Washington Group spokesman.
   
In Anniston, Ala., the company was able to fill 75 percent of its jobs with local workers.
   
"It simply makes sense, when the skill exists somewhere else, for us to try to pick them up," West said.
   
The higher paying, higher skill level jobs at the Pine Bluff Arsenal must be filled by workers experienced in similar industries, Keeler said. Washington Group looks to former petrochemical workers or former military members to take on those jobs.
   
Now, Washington Group is looking to Pueblo, Colo., to try to fill the last 100 slots at the Pine Bluff Arsenal. Weapons destruction for the Pueblo stockpile is still years away, so workers could possibly work at the Pine Bluff Arsenal, then head back to Colorado when weapons destruction begins there.
   
Washington Group relies largely on a mobile work force to man its projects across the globe. Some now working at the Pine Bluff Arsenal incineration site spent time at the Johnson Atoll Chemical Agent Disposal Facility, where nerve and blister agents were torched on a remote island in the Pacific Ocean during the 1990s.
   
And jobs with the company will be available elsewhere once all of the chemical weapons at the Pine Bluff Arsenal are gone. For those willing to move, the company offers positions on projects including nuclear waste disposal, mining and construction.
   
"I think you’re going to see an exodus," said jewelry store owner David Judkins, whose shop is within a few miles of the arsenal. Judkins said that when incineration is complete, he’s not yet sure if the loss of those workers will mean a loss of revenue for himself and other White Hall businesses.
   

WHAT’S LEFT
   
Weapons incineration got under way in Anniston more than a year ago, and business and government leaders there are already looking for ways to replace the jobs they’ll lose when the stockpile is wiped out.
   
"There will be opportunities with Washington if you’re willing to move," said Donavan Mager, a public affairs officer for the Washington Group in Alabama. "If you want to stay here, you’re going to have picked up enough skills to find work."
   
Industries can always use people who can operate forklifts or the dials and buttons in control rooms, he said.
   
But the paychecks in other industries will likely be smaller.
   
"Granted, they’re very wellpaid now for what they do, but they also aren’t making rubber duckies for a living," Mager said. "They’re dealing with some pretty nasty stuff."
   
In Jefferson County, business leaders are also thinking ahead.
   
"We’re hopeful we’ll be able to attract a biotech company or something along those lines to come in and fill in the hole," Matheny said.
   
"On one hand I’m ready for them to get started. On the other hand, all the businesses it brought to the community, I hate to see them go."