WASHINGTON - The U.S. Office of Trade Adjustment Assistance is expanding the range of former Baldwin Hardware employees who are eligible to apply for Worker Adjustment Assistance and Alternative Trade Adjustment Assistance.

Baldwin Hardware's plant in Reading, PA, was closed in fall 2011 by then owner Stanley Black & Decker. The vast majority of the decorative hardware company's production was shifted to Nogales, Mexico. The move cost some 160 workers their jobs.

Stanley Black & Decker sold its Hardware & Home Improvement Group, including Baldwin Hardware to Spectrum Brands Holdings last December for $1.4 billion in cash.

The U.S. Office of Trade Adjustment Assistance determined that some workers separated from employment at Baldwin Hardware had wages reported under a separate unemployment insurance tax account under “Spectrum Brands.” The assistance certification is being amended to include laid-off workers who had been paid by Spectrum Brands.

"The intent of the department's certification is to include all workers of the subject firm who were adversely affected by a shift in the production of decorative hardware to Mexico," according to a notice published in the March 26 Federal Register. The amended notice states, "All workers of Baldwin Hardware Corporation, a Subsidiary of Spectrum Brands, formerly known as a Subsidiary of Stanley Black & Decker, including on-site leased workers from Gage Personnel, Adecco, Mack Employment, and John Galt Staffing, Reading, Pennsylvania, who became totally or partially separated from employment on or after July 25, 2010, through August 10, 2013, are eligible to apply for adjustment assistance under Section 223 of the Trade Act of 1974, and are also eligible to apply for alternative trade adjustment assistance under Section 246 of the Trade Act of 1974."