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BY AMY DOMINELLO
Media General News Service
WASHINGTON – Talk about pressure.
In town for a National Association of Manufacturers meeting, Fletcher Steele of Winston-Salem learned Thursday he’d be talking to President Bush about how businesses are weathering the economic crisis.
His meeting with the president? About an hour away.
But Steele, the president of Pine Hall Brick, knew what he needed to say.
“We didn’t have to practice,” Steele said. “We know what’s happened. It was very easy for us to get up and talk.”
Steele was one of 14 business executives from NAM who spoke to Bush in a hastily-arranged private meeting to talk about the economic bailout package and how the inability to obtain credit is hurting their businesses.
Steele, a member of NAM’s board for small- and medium-sized manufacturers, said he told Bush what has occurred at Pine Hall Brick. The company makes and sells bricks to builders.
The burst of the housing bubble has hit them hard, Steele said, and business is down 40 percent from what it was two years ago. Earlier this week, the company had to lay off 19 people, he said.
Under the current economic conditions, Steele told the president next year is projected to be worse.
The group met with Bush for about 40 minutes and each businessperson was able to talk to the president about how the rough economic times are affecting them.
Steele said Bush was interested in what each person had to say, asked questions and was sympathetic to the group’s concerns.
Bush used the occasion to illustrate the impact of congressional inaction on a bailout proposal and pressed the House to pass the bill.
“This issue has gone way beyond New York and Wall Street,” Bush said.
Steele said he is philosophically opposed to the bailout, but supports it because it’s needed.
“We need a floor for the falling consumer confidence,” he said.
Contact Amy Dominello at 202-662-7671 or adominello@mediageneral.com
Media General News Service
WASHINGTON – Talk about pressure.
In town for a National Association of Manufacturers meeting, Fletcher Steele of Winston-Salem learned Thursday he’d be talking to President Bush about how businesses are weathering the economic crisis.
His meeting with the president? About an hour away.
But Steele, the president of Pine Hall Brick, knew what he needed to say.
“We didn’t have to practice,” Steele said. “We know what’s happened. It was very easy for us to get up and talk.”
Steele was one of 14 business executives from NAM who spoke to Bush in a hastily-arranged private meeting to talk about the economic bailout package and how the inability to obtain credit is hurting their businesses.
Steele, a member of NAM’s board for small- and medium-sized manufacturers, said he told Bush what has occurred at Pine Hall Brick. The company makes and sells bricks to builders.
The burst of the housing bubble has hit them hard, Steele said, and business is down 40 percent from what it was two years ago. Earlier this week, the company had to lay off 19 people, he said.
Under the current economic conditions, Steele told the president next year is projected to be worse.
The group met with Bush for about 40 minutes and each businessperson was able to talk to the president about how the rough economic times are affecting them.
Steele said Bush was interested in what each person had to say, asked questions and was sympathetic to the group’s concerns.
Bush used the occasion to illustrate the impact of congressional inaction on a bailout proposal and pressed the House to pass the bill.
“This issue has gone way beyond New York and Wall Street,” Bush said.
Steele said he is philosophically opposed to the bailout, but supports it because it’s needed.
“We need a floor for the falling consumer confidence,” he said.
Contact Amy Dominello at 202-662-7671 or adominello@mediageneral.com