| Churches worry about steels meltdown, future By Melissa Lauber
UMConnection Staff Smoke stacks and steeples often dot the same skylines, but in the Greater Dundalk area, they also intertwine to help shape peoples lives. In February, more than 1,300 people gathered at the United Steelworkers of America union hall in Dundalk to urge President Bush to impose a 40 percent tariff on imported steel. The President responded and, according to newspaper headlines, Stood Up for Steel by imposing a 30 percent tax on imported steel. Approximately 31 steel companies in the United States have filed for bankruptcy since 1988, when foreign companies began flooding the market with low cost steel, said a Bethlehem Steel spokesperson. Bethlehem Steel filed for bankruptcy in October. Company reports show its annual revenue has fallen by $1.3 billion since 1998. But the companys decline has been going on for years, residents report. In the 1940s Bethlehem Steel employed more that 50,000 people. Today, there are less than 3,500 workers at Sparrows Point and many area residents point to the plant as a relic of past glory. The tariffs are intended to rescue the struggling steel industry. But they come with a cost. The 40 percent tax, will increase the price of items made of steel. A study by the Heritage Foundation estimates that the tariffs will cost a family of four $283 a year. But these arent the costs that people in Dundalk are talking about. They were hopeful the tariffs would be used to cover the nearly $4.9 billion in health care and pension benefits that the companys employees and 25,000 local retirees have accrued. The retirees have been assured by Bethlehem Steels officials that they will be covered, in one way or another, with reasonable health benefits. But in darker moments, they worry about what would happen to the community if the families of those who worked at the steel mill lose the money theyve come to expect.  Although the United Methodist Church is a strong supporter of labor, some United Methodists in Dundalk curse the unions, which they believe demanded lavish benefits and outrageous salaries that brought about the downfall of the steel industry.
Greedy prima donnas thats what they are. The unions killed Bethlehem Steel, said a member of Lodge Forest UMC. Blue and white collar workers, even former union members, at Lodge Forest share this view. Youd be hard pressed to find anyone in the church who disagrees with that assessment, said Lodge Forests pastor, the Rev. Laurie Gates. While lamenting the decline of the steel plant, many of the members of Lodge Forest UMC, and nearby St. Matthews, Patapsco, Dundalk and Graceland UMCs in Dundalk, claim the presence of Bethlehem Steel has left an indelible stamp on the character of the community. Lodge Forest, which has a membership of 200, is in Edgemere, a part of Greater Dundalk. We are who we are because of Bethlehem Steel, said Dot Harrison, a member.  Her fellow members, Victor McVicker and Virginia Tolbert, remember when their church actually sat in the old mill town on Sparrows Point.
In 1887, the City Missionary and Church Extension Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church accepted the offer from Bethlehem Steel to start a church on mill property. The mill was everything then, said Tolbert. Work, houses, church, school, store, bowling alley that was the meaning of a company town. In the midst of the chimneys of this manufacturing place we want a steeple to point upward to a nobler life, not downward to a life of fatigue. This church means more than a mere gbwc_superusere to immortal life; it means organization, temperance, education and benevolences, said the Rev. J.J.G. Webster at the churchs cornerstone laying in 1888 in the Baltimore Sun. The church grew over the years to a membership of more than 400. In 1955, as Bethlehem Steel sought to expand, the company gave the church land in Edgemere. Today Gates lives in a parsonage built by the members of Lodge Forest who used steel girders from Bethlehem Steel. For her the house is symbolic of the power and character that accompanies the work of strong-hearted people working together to do something good in Gods name. While the shadow of the steel plant still falls over Lodge Forest and the Greater Dundalk area, many people are willing to ride out the possibilities and look toward the future. Tolbert points to the new homes being built down the road and the growing number of people who are discovering the areas affordable waterfront property. Smokestacks, she claims, can come and go. But the church endures. | 
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