Some workplace tours resume amid post-Sept. 11 security

CHATTANOOGA (AP) — Some businesses that benefit from showcasing their assembly lines and products are comfortable that workplace security changes since the Sept. 11 terrorist can accommodate tour groups.

At other workplace attractions, tour doors remain locked.

Plant tours help Komatsu America International’s marketing and recruiting efforts, according to Joe Fuqua, human resources manager.

“It’s important for potential customers to see how parts are made,” he said of the 45-minute tours that engineering students and prospective buyers take at the factory.

“Also, there’s a stereotype of a manufacturing facility as a dirty, noisy place to work,” Fuqua said of the business at the foot of Signal Mountain. “We want that perception changed.”

He said that promptly after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks the company started using a magnetic card-reader and turnstiles for staff access and began issuing security badges to guests who tour only by prearrangement.

“The security guards eyeball everybody,” he said. “If they saw something that didn’t look right, the person wouldn’t get in.”

At Mayfield Dairy’s visitor center in Athens, the 50,000 annual tour-takers are more closely guarded than three years ago, said Chad McKeehan, the assistant manager.

“After 9-11, a new set of rules from the plant manager enhanced things (security procedures) that we had,” he said. “Before 9-11, we were doing tours of 30 to 40 people at a time.”

He said tour groups are now limited to 10 people “with one tour guide to lead and a second who’s there for security, just to follow and watch the group.”

Conducted six days a week, the 40-minute tours are confined to designated areas, he said. No photographs are allowed.

“Everything is behind glass, and there is no direct contact with machines or production areas,” he said. “We have to be cautious of duffels or large diaper bags. They (visitors) check those belongings with the receptionist.”

As marketing vice president for the Chattanooga Convention and Visitors Bureau, Robert Pettway often fields requests about public tours.

He said many companies view the tours as a low-cost way to promote goods and services.

“It’s a real good way to let people see how a product is made and, sometimes, sample it. People enjoy that,” Pettway said. “They want to go behind the scenes.”

Once a popular field trip destination, the Bowater paper plant in Calhoun used to draw visitors five days a week for free, two-hour tours that included a vast warehouse with recycled paper piled from floor to ceiling.

But the factory’s open-door policy stopped soon after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, according to Joy Edgemon, employee relations manager.

“Everything changed after 9-11, ” she said. “Because of that, and also because we’ve downsized and no longer have the staff to take people through the mill (the paper plant), we just don’t do tours anymore.”

The paper-processing site is among several southeast Tennessee businesses that curtailed public visits when terrorist strikes against the nation nearly three years ago ushered in a new era of heightened security concerns.

The Tennessee Valley Authority’s Power Control Center that formerly treated downtown sightseers to a slide show and mini-museum will remain closed, according to TVA spokesman Gil Francis.

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Information from: Chattanooga Times Free Press, http://www.timesfreepress.com