Webster Engineering and Manufacturing officials expect to know early this week where the company will set up temporarily while its fire-damaged building is repaired.
The company is working on a contract for temporary office and assembly space, Webster president Ted Wrona said late Monday. For now, administrative offices have reopened in a construction trailer just outside the company’s damaged building at the Winfield industrial park.
Webster is considering space available at Rubbermaid or the General Electric Engine Services building on E. 19th.
Wrona estimates about a third of the company’s 70 employees have returned to work.
"Obviously assemblers and hourly employees are not back to work yet," he said. "We hope we can bring in more of the hourly workers as early as next week. But we have to bring parts in and there has to be room for assembly."
So far, the company knows little about the start of the Nov. 21 fire that destroyed parts of the building. Wrona said he was told the area of origin had been traced to a general area in the central portion of the approximately 40,000 sq. foot building.
Some computer equipment and the company’s main computer servers were salvageable.
It’s also likely that portions of the burned building will be usable "fairly soon," Wrona said.
Early estimates indicate the fire did more than $1 million in damage.
