OBSERVER Photo by M.J. Stafford A truck pulls away from the Wells ice cream plant in Dunkirk.

Some things are still unclear about Wells Enterprises’ decision to cut production at its Dunkirk ice cream factory, and Chautauqua County Industrial Development Agency head Mark Geise said Tuesday he is hoping for more specifics in an upcoming meeting.

“We’re on it, we don’t know exactly what that means at this point,” Geise said to the IDA board at its monthly meeting. “We’re in the process of setting up a meeting with the Wells management which would include not only the IDA, but the county executive (PJ Wendel), Empire State Development representatives, the mayor (Wilfred Rosas), etc.”

Geise read some of Wells’ press release announcing a scale back in Dunkirk to five production lines. The changes are supposed to start in 2023 and Wells is gradually informing its employees how they will be affected, according to the release.

Geise wants answers from Wells on how many lines they are currently running, as well as the number of employees who will be affected. “I’m hoping in our meeting with them we can get more specifics. They’re sort of keeping it under their hat right now,” he said.

One IDA member said he heard it is currently 20 lines. IDA Chief Financial Officer Richard Dixon said, “That sounds about right but I’m not sure, but I know the reduction was going to be substantial.”

Dixon then related what he called “positive news” from a conversation he had about the cutbacks with a Wells attorney.

“They do plan to come back slowly but surely and make sure they’re doing it right, and the production lines are right when they do come back,” he said. “I think it’s a good story, they just hit a little bump in the road here and hopefully they’ll get over it.”

Wells bought the facility, formerly Dunkirk Ice Cream and Fieldbrook Farms, in 2019. Until announcing the cutbacks last week, it had plans in place for an expansion of equipment and production capacity at the plant. Wells also had a job expansion planned, holding a job fair in June 2021 in Dunkirk.