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The business community in 2016 can be characterized by ups and downs, and starts and stops.
Workers at the General Motors Assembly Plant in Lordstown came into the new year ready to roll with the anticipated launch of the second generation of the popular Chevrolet Cruze, but with November came news of massive layoffs at the plant.
The year also saw the beginning and end of daily commercial passenger service at the Youngstown-Warren Regional Airport, longtime Warren company Peerless Electric Co. closing its plant on West Market Street and the abrupt closing of ITT Technical Institute. Even so, the year had its high points -- ground was broken for a new power plant in Lordstown and Matalco started operating its new 225,000-square-foot, $100 million plant, also in Lordstown.
Those and more are among the top business stories that made headlines in 2016.
GM cuts
third shift
At the start of 2016, employees were looking forward to the launch of the new Cruze, but as sales dropped in favor of other, larger vehicles as fuel prices stayed low, the Detroit automaker announced it would cut Lordstown's third shift Jan. 23, eliminating more than 1,200 jobs.
The move had a ripple effect on other local plants, including Lordstown Seating Systems in Lordstown and Comprehensive Logistics in Austintown. Both companies, part of the Cruze's supply chain, have also announced job cuts.
Flights start, stop
For the first time in more than a decade, the airport in Vienna had daily commercial air service. The maiden flight left for Chicago O'Hare International Airport July 1, two years after the Western Reserve Port Authority, which runs the airport, approved an operating and use agreement with Kennesaw, Ga.-based Aerodynamics Inc. to restart daily passenger flights.
But the airline stopped the service abruptly Aug. 24 -- one a week after the port authority withdrew its financial support for the daily commercial service, effectively grounding the flight plan.
Power plant
takes shape
Ground was broken in June for the $900 million Lordstown Energy Center facility on Henn Parkway in Lordstown. Developer William Siderewicz, president of Massachusetts-based Clean Energy Future LLC, said he expects the project to send a $1.5 billion economic ripple across the region. The plant is being funded by private investment, with no money coming from the village, Trumbull County, state or federal governments. Plans are for the plant, which is expected to provide hundreds of jobs directly and indirectly, to be operational by May 2018. It could provide power to 600,000 customers.
Cafaro Co.
moves to Niles
After operating nearly half a century in Youngstown, the Cafaro Co. spent Memorial Day weekend and part of June moving into its new headquarters at the Eastwood Mall Complex in Niles. The construction of the company's new offices at its flagship property is part of an estimated $30 million multi-phase project that includes a new hotel and events center. The office space is three stories and houses about 200 employees.
Cafaro announced plans to move to Niles in October 2014. The company sold its old office building on Belmont Avenue to Phantom Fireworks for $900,000.
Matalco begins production
A June 15 ribbon cutting marked the official opening of the new Matalco aluminum billet manufacturing facility in the Ohio Commerce Center in Lordstown.
Robert Roscetti, vice president, said the Canada-based company's $100 million investment in the plant is its largest in the U.S. to date and, combined with the company's facilities in Canton and Brampton, Ontario, Canada, establishes its position as North America's largest aluminum re-melt billet manufacturer with a capacity to produce more than 700 million pounds of billets a year.
The billets are sent to many local extrusion plants.
GM Lordstown marks 50th
Fifty years after the 1966 Chevrolet Impala sport sedan rolled off the assembly line at the General Motors Assembly Plant and through labor disputes and GM's bankruptcy, the plant kept producing and celebrated its golden anniversary in May.
More than 10,000 people toured the plant during the opening day of the facility's two-day celebration. Hosted by the plant and United Auto Workers Local 1112, the first union to represent Lordstown employees, the event also featured a car show that drew enthusiasts from across the country.
Lordstown has produced a long line of cars, including the Cruze, Chevrolet Caprice, Pontiac Firebird, Chevrolet Vega, GMC Vandura, Buick Skylark and Chevrolet Cavalier.
Peerless goes idle
Peerless Electric Co. shut down its West Market Street plant in September after operating in Warren for more than 122 years. The company, a subsidiary of Dublin-based HBD Industries Inc., reported business conditions warranted the permanent shutdown.
At one time the plant, where, according to the company's website, electric motors were manufactured for "pump, military and other commercial applications," employed hundreds, but in recent years the number dwindled to about 11 workers. Peerless was founded in Warren in 1893 and was acquired by HBD in 1989.
ITT closes
ITT Technical Institute in Austintown abruptly shut its doors in September, but federal, state and local officials moved quickly to help people impacted by the shutdown transition to other educational facilities. The move, which impacted more than 3,000 students at nine locations in Ohio, came days after federal education officials banned the for-profit college chain from enrolling new students who use federal financial aid.
Injection well path clears
More than two years after the Ohio Department of Natural Resources idled a deep-brine injection well in Weathersfield, a judge gave the company her conditional support to reopen it.
Franklin County Common Pleas Court Judge Kimberly Cocroft ordered well owner American Water Management Services and ODNR to each submit a proposal outlining parameters under which the well would resume operations.
ODNR, which regulates class II injection wells, ordered AWMS to shut down the well in September 2014 following a 2.1-magnitude earthquake Aug. 31, 2014. The two sides have been battling since.
Redeveloping RG Steel
The piece-by-piece tear down of the Mahoning Valley's last standing blast furnace at the former RG Steel mill was initiated in July when BDM Holdings, the company that now owns the site, started removing asbestos from the structure. Its demolition marks the official end of integrated steelmaking in the Mahoning Valley.
The mill was permanently idled in May 2012, putting about 1,200 people out of work.
BDM has been working to ready the property for a new owner since securing demolition permits from Howland about three years ago. In September, officials from Howland, Warren Township, Warren and BDM announced the formation of a Joint Economic Development District they said they hope will attract new businesses and jobs to the property.
vshank@tribtoday.com