news-record.com

WINSTON-SALEM (AP) — Pace Airlines Inc., a charter airline and maintenance company, has cut up to two-thirds of its 300-member work force just weeks after losing a major maintenance contract with Continental Airlines Inc.

Pace Airlines cut between 125 and 215 employees at its maintenance operation in Winston-Salem, the Winston-Salem Journal reported Wednesday. The company had about 300 local full- and part-time workers. Pace also has operations in Atlantic City, N.J., and Dallas.

Company owner William Rodgers Sr. declined to specify how many jobs were cut.

Rodgers bought the company in June and pledged a 120-day program to improve its finances. In a memo to employees Friday, Rodgers said he had secured "a multimillion-dollar line of credit" with a source he did not identify. The money was supposed to be available to the company by Wednesday.

Late last month, Pace lost a contract to perform heavy-maintenance checks on some of Continental's 737 aircraft. The company had landed the deal, which was supposed to run through at least 2010, in December 2007.

Pace employees said they have had little work to perform since losing the Continental contract.

Pace also runs a charter-airline service from its base at Winston-Salem's Smith-Reynolds Airport.

The company owes the Airport Commission of Forsyth County more than $888,000 in overdue lease payments. Pace started falling behind on its $145,000-a-month rent in October, airport commission chairman Tom McKim said, but has made partial payments from time to time. The commission didn't want to lose Pace as an airport tenant, he said.

"We recognize that they had some business challenges, and as time has gone on, we have tried to work with them as best we could to be supportive of their efforts to go forward as a business entity," McKim said.