President Christopher Navetta lunches with Blast Furnaces workers

On Friday of last week ten Blast Furnaces workers took up U. S. Steel Kosice President Christopher Navetta's invitation to a joint lunch. All trades were represented - furnacemen, crane operators, maintenance staff, turners and fitters, foremen... Pavol Prihoda, Jan Pihulie, Peter Vasuta, Stefan Vastag, Jozef Beres, Julius Peko, Frantisek Borov, Pavol Kobulnicky, Pavol Kuruc and one woman, machine operator Anna Likerova.
The meeting, which featured a pleasant and relaxed atmosphere, was also attended by USSK Vice-president Operations Scott Pape, Vice-president Personnel and Organization Martin Pitorak and General Manager Primary Anthony Pacilio. In his introductory speech Christopher Navetta rated very highly the part played by his guests - not only them but all the employees of the Blast Furnaces division generally - in the success achieved last year by the whole company.

Best results in costs-saving evaluated

On Thursday of last week, February 26th, the best part of 150 managers met in the afternoon in the cinema hall at Ferrocentrum for the big Costs-saving Program planning meeting for the year 2004. Last year twenty divisions and specialist departments joined in the costs-saving program, coming up with 597 projects altogether of which as many as 507 actually led to savings being made during 2003.
First of all U. S. Steel Kosice President Christopher Navetta and Vice-president Operations Scott Pape presented awards to the originators of the best costs-saving and yield-improving projects in 2003. The competition to find the best teams was won by the Quality Management Department, second place was taken by the Transport Division, and third went to the Financial Investments Department. The awards to the teams with projects producing the greatest yield improvements were as follows: first place was taken by the Steel Plants Division, second by the Research and Development Department, and third went to the Power Plant Division.
There was a special prize for Jozef Sasarak from R&D for his high level of creativity in fulfiling the objectives of the Costs-saving Program. Since the outset of its implementation at U. S. Steel Kosice, he has come up with six projects which have produced extraordinary savings.

Sport beats drugs

This is the slogan under which the Kosice Regional Council will be organizing the second annual sports olympiad for secondary school pupils later this year. Journalists were informed about this at a press conference given by Kosice Regional Council Chairman Rudolf Bauer on Monday.
Last year the scope of this olympiad was limited to holding a street basketball competition, but this year the competitions will be expanded to include athletics and chess. Just like last year, the olympiad will be supported by U. S. Steel Kosice with considerable sponsorship this year as well. There will be 119 schools from all over the region taking part in the event, with more than 42 000 pupils entering the competitions. In March and April the class rounds will be taking place, then the district rounds in May and the regional finals will be in June.
The street basketball finals on June 12th in Namestie oslobodite3ov (Liberators' Square) in Kosice will consist of tournaments involving 16 boys' and 16 girls' teams, the final competitions in the athletics disciplines will take place on June 9th at the Technical University of Kosice's Akademik Stadium, and the climax of the chess tournament will be on June 10th at the Cassovia Shopping Center.