Tribe, Jewish family open kosher packing plant

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By JOE DUGGAN / Lincoln Journal Star

GORDON — The tall Oglala Lakota with the gray braid asks if the man in the black yarmulke is a rabbi.

“I thought all of them were rabbis,” says Walt Big Crow, a member of the Oglala Tribal Council, nodding toward a pair of Jewish men standing across the parking lot.

Then Big Crow smiles at his assumption. “Like we all live in tipis.”

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Sholom Rubashkin (left), owner of the Local Pride beef plant in Gordon, and Gary Ruse, plant manager, listen to Walt Big Crow, an Oglala Lakota Tribal Council member, discuss the need for affordable housing in Gordon. (Joe Duggan)

Sholom Rubashkin (left), owner of the Local Pride beef plant in Gordon, and Gary Ruse, plant manager, listen to Walt Big Crow, an Oglala Lakota Tribal Council member, discuss the need for affordable housing in Gordon. (Joe Duggan)

For almost a year, Oglala from South Dakota’s Pine Ridge Indian Reservation and an ultra-orthodox Jewish family from New York City have partnered to start a kosher meatpacking plant in Gordon. On Thursday, they showed their progress to the community and, in the process, maybe got to know each other a little better.

Local Pride hosted a ribbon-cutting ceremony in its parking lot that featured a free lunch of grilled kosher hamburgers and hotdogs. Several hundred people, including plant workers, community officials, politicians and business leaders, ate under temporary awnings as Sholom Rubashkin, one of the plant’s owners, mused about his family’s latest business venture.

“Why did we come to Gordon, Nebraska?” he asked. “I don’t know. Believe me, I don’t know.”

As the crowd’s laughter died down, he amended his answer:

“Good cattle, good water, good people.”

It’s not the first small-town packing plant Rubashkin, his father and brother have opened. In 1989, they started a kosher plant called Agriprocessors in Postville, Iowa. The family has excelled at producing kosher meats under the strictest Jewish laws, growing the Iowa plant from a handful of employees to more than 800.

The Rubashkins belong to a Hasidic Jewish community called the Lubavitchers, who scrupulously follow the Torah.

On Thursday, Rubashkin and Rabbi Michael Shpizer, who works at the Gordon plant, stood out in the crowd, with their yarmulkes (commonly called skullcaps), the long tassels protruding from beneath their shirts and their banter in Hebrew. In English, they conversed warmly with anyone, but politely declined handshakes offered by women because they are forbidden to touch any female but their wives.

The Nebraska plant is also unique in its partnership with the Oglala Lakota Nation, which is just north of Gordon in South Dakota. Oglala leaders declared the plant and 300 surrounding acres of Gordon part of its economic empowerment zone.

For every person living within the zone it employs — Native or otherwise — the company qualifies for a $3,000 federal tax credit.

The company gets labor and tax breaks. But what does the tribe get?

“The goal of the empowerment zone designation is to reduce dependency,” said David “Tally” Plume, executive director of the Oglala Oyate Woitancan Empowerment Zone. “You reduce dependency through job creation, education and homeownership.”

Plant manager Gary Ruse said about 65 of the nearly 100 plant employees are Native. He estimated about 15 percent of the work force is Latino and the remainder is Anglo.

Starting pay is $8.25 per hour without benefits. Ruse said the company plans to offer benefits as soon as it can.

Two highly trained rabbis perform the ritual kosher slaughter of each animal, which involves slitting its throat with a razor-sharp knife. One of the rabbis inspects the organs and lungs of the animal to determine if it qualifies as kosher.

The plant slaughters about 110 cattle per week, Ruse said. Until recently, all carcasses were quickly trucked to the Iowa plant for further processing, but the Gordon plant has just started to do some boning. By soon adding two additional rabbis, the company hopes to double its daily slaughter.

The company got more help Thursday when Gov. Dave Heineman presented a $505,000 check to Rubashkin on behalf of the city of Gordon.

“It’s every bit as important that we grow Gordon, Rushville and Chadron as it is that we grow Omaha and Lincoln,” the governor said, eliciting a raucous cheer from the audience.

Leaders of the northern Panhandle community of 1,800 — about 430 miles northwest of Lincoln — obtained the funds from the state’s Community Development Block Grant program, said Gordon City Administrator Fred Hlava. The money represents a loan to help with plant expansion costs.

Gordon clearly stands to benefit if the plant succeeds, but so do surrounding cattle producers. Most of the cattle slaughtered at the plant have come from the region.

So far, Gordon hasn’t experienced a sizeable influx of new residents because most tribal members commute. But that will change if the Nebraska plant follows the pattern of the one in Iowa.

Rubashkin prays it will.

“The hope is like a farmer planting a seed and God will help it grow.”

Reach Joe Duggan at 473-7239 or jduggan@journalstar.com.