WILTON, Maine — An emergency meeting was held on Wednesday night in the town of Wilton. The top priority? Tuesday’s announcement that the Barclaycard call center will be closing at the end of March.
When the call center closes, 227 will be out of work. The meeting was an attempt by the community to get ahead of the problem and help the people that are losing their jobs.
The department of labor, as well as other organizations, attended to put together 'community rapid response team.' That team will assist Barclay employees with things that may not be included in their severance packages and to remind those workers that the town is behind them.
“This community is so resilient. We will figure it out, we always have, we always will.” Wilton Selectman, Tom Saviello said.
Saviello and the community are ready to support those who are losing their jobs. He says the entire community will also struggle with the loss of the call center.
“We'll be hurting for a short period of time because that's money they had to spend in the community whether it was to go to the restaurants, buy a car, go to the stores in downtown Farmington or Wilton to shop,” Saviello said.
There are no other call centers in Franklin County at which these employees to can get jobs, but there are some others elsewhere looking to hire.
“There are some outside Franklin county and we've already started to receive some inquiries who are looking for workers.” Town manager, Rhonda Irish, said.
But why is Barclay's closing this call center?
“I think a lot of it stems back to when Barclay's lost the L.L.Bean credit card. And that was the beginning of the end for Barclay's in Wilton.” State senator, Russell Black, said.
Barclay's is leaving Maine, but the recent renovations it's made to the building, another company could easily open a call center here in Wilton.
“We have quality workers and we want to put them back to work right there,” Black said.
The small town of Wilton is feeling the love from lawmakers across Maine including, Congressman Jared Golden, Senator Susan Collins and Senator Angus King.