Alcoa to lay off 500 at its Massena aluminium smelter

Aluminium major Alcoa says it will be shutting down its West smelter plant in Massena and will abandon plans to modernize the already-shuttered Massena East plant.

The announcement from the company will put nearly 500 people out of work, the latest in a long series of cutbacks in Alcoa's Massena operations over the past 10 years. The company says it was forced to take decisive action after seeing aluminium prices drop 30 percent in the past year.

"Very concerned about the impact this will have in the short term ...also the long-term ... last major employer that we have ... It is detrimental to Massena," said Massena Mayor Timmy Currier.

"Spend the next few days discussing what is best for our members, getting all the benefits we can, whether it be state or out of our contract that we can for them," said Robert Smith from United Steel Workers.

Alcoa says it will begin scaling back operations before the end of the year and close the West plant in early 2016. Alcoa will keep open a casting and extrusion plant, employing about 220 people.

But just last year, Alcoa agreed to maintain 750 jobs in Massena in exchange for low-cost power from the state. State officials and local lawmakers expressed anger and disappointment that the company is failing to keep its end of the bargain.