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Product demand sparking business Manufacturing industry is getting significant boost from companies investing in tooling and equipment By RACHEL ABBEY McCAFFERTY rmccafferty@crain.com
of white and black students. And considering the Hispanic population was one of the fastest-growing communities in the city and poised to make up a major part of the future workforce, concerns continued to mount. But in a few short years, the district managed to double the Hispanic graduation rate to about 61% in 2013, which is more in line with the national average.
Manufacturers across the nation have opened their wallets to buy more tooling and equipment this fall. That’s driving business for the companies that make those products, and it indicates growing optimism in the industry at large. Bill Beattie, president of BarMORE INSIDE dons & Oliver, a Brown Gibbons Lang machinery mak& Co. report shows er in Solon, said high growth for U.S. companies manufacturing across the counsector. Page 19 try are approaching 80% capacity utilization, which is a high number based on historical norms. Customers that might have been putting off purchasing equipment are having a harder time doing so now, he said. Bardons & Oliver makes equipment for processing tube, pipe and bar for a diverse range of industries, including energy,
See CURVE, page 8
See DEMAND, page 17
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Esperanza executive director Victor Ruiz, a product of Cleveland public schools, says the Hispanic community is critical to Cleveland’s growth.
GETTING AHEAD OF THE CURVE 30% The graduation rate of Hispanic students in Cleveland public schools in 2011, an all-time low.
64.3% The current graduation rate for Hispanic students, an all-time best.
With help of Esperanza, Hispanic graduation rates in Cleveland have soared By TIMOTHY MAGAW tmagaw@crain.com
In 2011, Cleveland Metropolitan School District CEO Eric Gordon decried the district’s dismal Hispanic graduation rate as a crisis in the community. At 30%, that figure — an all-time low — was more than 20 percentage points lower than that of the district’s overall student population and well below that
Firefighters banking on Lorain County with latest addition By JEREMY NOBILE jnobile@crain.com
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Firefighters Community Credit Union in Cleveland is continuing expansion efforts with its first foray into Lorain County at the end of the year via its acquisition of Sun Center Federal Credit Union of LaGrange.The transaction takes effect
ographic footprint and bolstering membership since the adoption of its community charter in 2005. Firefighters, which currently serves Lake and Cuyahoga counties, will take over operations of Sun’s five Lorain County locations. The deal has been in the works since spring. Firefighters will add $35 million in assets, about 4,000 members and
18 employees with the merger, said CEO Ben Laurendeau. The deal will take Firefighters to $235 million in assets with about 32,000 members and 80 employees. Mergers of credit unions have become increasingly common since the end of the Great Recession, Laurendeau said, especially for Firefighters, which is complet-
ing its fourth acquisition in about as many years in the transaction with Sun. “It’s just very difficult for a small credit union to survive with additional regulatory burdens (and) aging memberships. … There are a lot of forces that make it hard to survive,” he said. “We want to be an See FIREFIGHTERS, page 8
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Dec. 31, pending regulatory approvals. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed. The deal is rooted in succession planning for Sun, from which CEO Brenda Hammond will retire in December, and in strategic planning for Firefighters, where board members have been pushing the credit union to continue expanding its ge-
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