(La Porte, IN) - A LaPorte manufacturing firm is moving forward on plans to spend $5 million on a new building to house its professional office staff currently in separate facilities on the grounds.
As an incentive, New York Blower, with a local workforce of just over 200, was granted tax credits from the city on the new construction.
LaPorte Economic Advancement Partnership Executive Director Bert Cook said offices for professional staff members are currently housed in several buildings that make up the company at 171 Factory St. The company’s footprint extends to nearby Thomas Rose Industrial Park.
“Ultimately, it will kind of bring all of their professional staff under one roof,” Cook said.
New York Blower, which opened a fifth U.S. manufacturing plant in 2022, has been a maker of catalog and industrial custom fans, blowers, and ventilation systems since 1889. The company has had a branch in LaPorte for 105 years.
There will be a net 65 percent annual savings for the company on property taxes from the new construction over 10 years, under a resolution approved unanimously by the city council Monday night. In exchange, Cook said, the company must pay the remaining 35 percent of its yearly savings to the city’s Urban Enterprise Association in exchange for the tax credits.
Under a longstanding program, those monies are reinvested by the UEA into areas like downtown to help building owners pay for façade improvements on their structures. The company also intends to beautify a roughly two-acre site that was once an active part of the New York Blower operation near the entrance to the firm at Factory and Boston Streets.
New York Blower Executive Vice President of Operations Scott Hamilton said a greenspace, including shrubs and flowers, will be created where an old industrial-type building stood until it was demolished a few years ago. He said the grounds, made to reflect in some way the company’s heritage in LaPorte, will be available for use by employees and, generally, to the public.
“It’s just been kind of an industrial, old-school look for a long time. We think beautifying that corner will make a big difference,” he said.
Mayor Tom Dermody called New York Blower one of the city’s “cornerstone employers” and a “true partner” of the community. The company has hosted welding classes and used some of its employees as instructors since the program started in November of 2022. The classes, open to adults and high school students, were created through a partnership with Ivy Tech to meet demand by local employers.
“Employers in our area have been telling us that’s a skill they really needed,” said Erik Nelson, the Workforce Development Coordinator for LEAP, who also noted that classes for adults last for about six weeks while students, taught separately, attend throughout the school year.
He said Howmet Corporation became a partner in January by providing equipment and materials for teaching a certain type of welding required at its nearby aerospace parts-making plant.
“We just so appreciate all they do to prepare our future workforce and investment in the city,” Dermody said.
