Rep. Steve Cohen of Memphis chaired a House subcommittee hearing today on the decisions by GM and Chrysler to close 3,000 auto dealerships as part of their government-led reorganizations. Ron Bloom, the Obama administration's top adviser on the auto industry, got an earful from Cohen and other lawmakers, according to this article in The Detroit News.
The story doesn't say which dealership Cohen is referring, but the only Memphis-area dealership on the list of 789 to be closed was Southland Chrysler-Jeep, which is actually in Southaven (however, it was in Whitehaven for many years before moving to Mississippi in the late '90s).
UPDATE: The Hill has more about this dealership, which was in fact Southland.
Rep. Steve Cohen, D-Tenn., chairman of the subcommittee holding the hearing, said he wanted to understand "to what extent the task force considered the impact of widespread dealership closures on the economy and on communities around the nation."
He said he was "particularly concerned about the impact of these closures on minority dealers, who I feel will suffer disproportionately." He said the closing of a minority Chrysler dealer in Memphis was "unconscionable."
Bloom said the Treasury Department had reviewed data that showed minority dealers weren't unfairly targeted.
The story doesn't say which dealership Cohen is referring, but the only Memphis-area dealership on the list of 789 to be closed was Southland Chrysler-Jeep, which is actually in Southaven (however, it was in Whitehaven for many years before moving to Mississippi in the late '90s).
UPDATE: The Hill has more about this dealership, which was in fact Southland.
Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.), who chaired Tuesday's hearing, wonders why John Roy's Chrysler dealership in his district was terminated. Roy was the only African-American Chrysler dealer within a 300-mile radius around Memphis, and won business from four states. He was No. 1 in sales in the Memphis metropolitan area, but was still terminated.
"To me, it is unconscionable that Chrysler would treat a successful and loyal dealer in such a manner," Cohen said in an opening statement.
It’s an aberration that the President of the United States endorses a mosque so close to the biggest and most atrocious terrorist act in the history of the World!It’a spit in the face of the people that died there in horror; their families, and the rest of us Americans. It is unacceptable!We should wait until the mosque is finished, and then blow it up while all the Muslims are in there praying!!! See how they feel about that