Area businesswoman discusses economy with Bush
President Bush lunched Monday with Mayor Richard M. Daley and the leaders of Aon Corp., The Boeing Co. and McDonald's Corp. at the Union League Club of Chicago.
There amid the political and business elite also sat Sandra Westlund-Deenihan, owner of a small manufacturing firm in Schaumburg, Quality Float Works Inc.
"It was a very surreal day," said Westlund-Deenihan, also a newly appointed Hanover Township trustee. "I'm still shell-shocked."
She and about a dozen others later met with the president to express their views on the economy from their points of view.
Westlund-Deenihan told the president her 22-person business was able to double its employment because of free trade agreements he got passed, and she stressed the need for a better-educated alternative work force for manufacturing.
"He did agree that community colleges are a great alternative (for educating for the manufacturing work force)," she said. "He did agree there has to be another pipeline for vocational training."
How Westlund-Deenihan got an audience with the president began with a phone call from the White House before the holidays asking if she was interested in attending the luncheon.
Westlund-Deenihan is an outspoken advocate for the manufacturing industry, writing for opinion pages and making speeches.
"I'm kind of the poster child for manufacturing," she said. "Manufacturing is the backbone of the economy. We were saying (to the president) there is room for growth in '08."
Advocating for better vocational education, Westlund-Deenihan said 70 percent of the applicants to her company fail an eighth-grade math exam.
"If I don't have a digital clock on the wall, they can't tell time," she said.
At the same time, she told the president, Illinois has lost 195,000 manufacturing jobs since 2000.
Quality Float Works is a 93-year-old company that manufactures metal floats, or hollow spherical parts, used to level liquids. The floats are used for everything from gasoline pumps to oil refineries. Its 2007 revenue reached $2.2 million.
Westlund-Deenihan is the third generation in her family to run the business, which is changing with the times.
Her son, Jason Speer, invented a float valve assembly that attaches to the floats and purifies water. Speer's invention helped reinvent the company, which now follows free trade agreements into Asia, Canada, Europe and South America.
On Monday, Westlund-Deenihan was the only woman in the small group of business leaders who met with Bush after the luncheon. She still marvels at her star-studded group.
"I was just one of the boys," she said.