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Alamo Drafthouse Cinema this month temporarily laid off 199 workers, according to a state filing.
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Alamo Drafthouse Cinema this month temporarily laid off 199 workers, according to a state filing.

Flood of layoffs reported to state

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The coronavirus pandemic has led to a host of layoffs reported voluntarily to the state this month.

Eleven Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act filings submitted in March to the Missouri Division of Workforce Development cited COVID-19 for layoffs. WARN notices are voluntary and uncommon. Prior to March, 15 notices had been filed for the state's fiscal year that started in July 2019. Four other notices in March did not cite the coronavirus as the reason for the layoffs.

Locally, Alamo Drafthouse Cinema and the Branson Convention Center reported layoffs to the state via WARN notices this month.

The movie theater at 4000 South Ave. disclosed in a March 23 filing that 199 employees were temporarily laid off. Springfield Business Journal previously reached out to Alamo officials about possible layoffs, but they did not reply.

The WARN notice indicates the layoffs were implemented on March 16. Servers were the hardest hit, at 84, following by kitchen staff, at 45. Nine salaried managers also are impacted, according to the notice.

"This layoff results from unforeseeable business circumstances stemming from the coronavirus," the WARN notice reads. "We are hopeful that this layoff implemented on March 16, 2020, will be temporary.

"However, because of the unforeseen business conditions that have impacted our business, we are not able to state with certainty when the layoff will end, and it is possible that it may turn into a permanent separation from employment of six months or more."

In Branson, the city-owned convention center attached to a Hilton hotel on March 22 submitted a WARN notice that 57 employees were laid off two days earlier.

Officials cited a "dramatic downturn in business and occupancy caused by the coronavirus natural disaster."

"This mass layoff is expected to be temporary," the WARN notice reads.

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