2014 expansions helpful to Huntington County's economy

The Business Dynamics Report 2014, released by NIRP in conjunction with the Community Research Institute at Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne (IPFW), was released this month and tracks business events within the region.

According to the report, 2014 saw the fewest industrial closings since 2008, with only two plant closings announced. This affected 191 jobs in the region. This is down from nine closings affecting 511 jobs in 2013. The highest amount of closings in the report, which covered 2008 to 2014, was in 2009 when 44 plants closed, affecting around 3,600 jobs.

Huntington County Economic Development Director Mark Wickersham said this report includes data from Huntington County at the industrial level.

He said HCED clients contributed nearly $35 million in private investments in 2014.

"The regional data shows that Huntington County trailed only Allen County in economic development productivity in 2014 in the 10-county market," Wickersham said. "Clearly, the number of (new) jobs and retained jobs and the economic impact of whether it be expansions or new attractions in the industrial sections outpace and have a faster impact on the local economy than any other sector."

Several companies in the county started expansion projects in 2014.

One of those was United Technologies, which received a tax abatement in September to add two new production lines. The investment will create 30 to 50 new jobs with salaries of between $1,044 and $1,733 a month. It will also retain 766 current employees.

Another local expansion was at Huntington Aluminum, which was an investment of around $3.2 million and will create up to 41 jobs by 2017.

PHD also announced an expansion that would create 22 new jobs by 2017 and Novae began an expansion expected to create 75 new jobs.

These expansions are good for the economy as a whole, Wickersham said.

"When your industrial base is stable and growing, the industrial sector's success will support expansions and opportunities in other sectors of the local economy," he said.

Tom Wall, president of the Huntington County commissioners, said this report is "exciting."

"It's showing the teamwork of Huntington County and how we're all working together," he said.

Wall said being the second in the region is a "huge win" for the county.

"This year, 2015, is looking really good so far," he added.

Huntington City Mayor Brooks Fetters said people in the city and county need to have meaningful employment and the county and region has done a good job in filling industrial space.

"We're sitting at a 5.3 percent unemployment in December," he said. "You've seen Bendix and (United Technologies) and Gerdau and CSP (Continental Structural Plastics) and JO Wolf is a smaller one, but so many of our industrial and manufacturers have been expanding and employing more people."

Wickersham agreed that things are on track for a good economic development year in 2015.

"We've had two announcements already with Gerdau and UTEC (United Technologies) in January announcing their project expansions and the pipeline, as we refer to it in economic development, of inquiries and projects that are evaluating our area are very robust so it's off to a good start," he said.

John Sampson, president and CEO of the Northeast Indiana Regional Partnership, said it was too early to tell how 2015 is coming along.

"We know there is plenty of potential out there and we keep coming back to this theme that there are opportunities to grow in this region, given that we have the right skilled talent," he said.