Post by ferryfast admin on Feb 8, 2006 20:20:37 GMT -5
Federal Grant Boosts State Boat Building Industry
By Victoria Wallack
A coalition of boatyards from Kennebunkport to Calais is celebrating the news that Maine is getting a $15 million federal grant to grow its boatbuilding industry and expand the use of new materials in the process.
The grant is coming from the federal Department of Labor and is part of a $195 million initiative by the Bush administration to encourage innovation and grow new regional economies and jobs that require skilled workers and pay good wages. Maine got word last week that it is receiving one of only 13 grants awarded throughout the country; it will provide $5 million a year over three years.
“It wasn’t done on politics,” said Stephen Von Vogt, chairman of the recently formed Maine Built Boats coalition. “We got it because we had such a novel idea and also boats are pretty cool.”
The grant will be spent developing new boatbuilding techniques and composite materials that make boats lighter and more durable; marketing Maine boats to a wider audience; training future boat builders through the University of Maine and Community College System; and providing capital for new or expanding businesses.
“We’re really good at this stuff,” said Von Vogt, ticking off names of famous Maine-made boats, including Morris, Hinckley and Hodgdon. “We’re right at the tipping point. If we reinvest in it and do it right, we can significantly grow the industry. If we do it wrong, we’ll take a bunch of money the feds hand us and we’ll end up with nothing.”
Von Vogt works for Hodgdon Yachts of East Boothbay and also runs a spin-off company in Portland to build a prototype of a high-speed boat made of high-tech composites commissioned by the Navy to transport Navy SEALS. He helped write the grant application along with others from the boatbuilding and composite industry and members of the state departments of Labor, Economic and Community Development and Education.
In some ways his company embodies the intention of the grant. It uses technology to come up with new materials and building methods; serves a high-end market niche; and hires a range of skilled workers, including some with master’s degrees in engineering.
Von Vogt said it was “stroke of genius” for the state to bring all the players together to work on the grant.
“It’s absolutely critical that industry be involved otherwise not one job will be created other than in Augusta, where there’s plenty of jobs already,” he said.
“If you talk to boatyards up and down the coast, they can’t hire enough qualified people in good, well-paying jobs,” Von Vogt said. “People who are training boat builders, they can’t fill their classes. There’s something wrong there.”
“One of the things we need desperately is an educated work-force,” agreed Martin Grimnes of Harbor Technologies in Brunswick, whose company makes piers and docks out of composites to replace steel and pressure-treated wood.
Grimnes, who also worked on the grant application, would like the state to develop the capacity to build composite commercial ferries and become the national leader in that market.
Building with composites, which include the traditional fiberglass, Kevlar, carbon fiber and more, is a growth industry even though fiberglass has been around for a long time, Grimnes said. Ferries made out of composites would be much more economical to run because they would be lighter, and the savings in fuel costs alone would make them a good investment, he said.
“The governor in his wisdom applied and competed for this grant and it had to focus on a growth industry. Composites is one of the targeted industries. It could have been bio-tech,” Grimnes said, but the state is building on a long tradition by marrying composites and boatbuilding.
Janet Yancey-Wrona of the Department of Economic and Community Development, said when grant applications were first announced in November, the governor’s office was challenged to decide “what has enough traction right now to really make it. We could have picked anything,” she said, but settled on boat building and composites because of Maine’s tradition of being a boatbuilding state.
Now the challenge will be to market the Maine brand, and part of the grant will be used for marketing materials, trade shows and displaying new products.
“Our small boatyards by themselves are not going to be competitive for major contracts,” Yancey-Wrona said, but the state can market itself as a boatbuilding and composite research hub.
Providing research and development funds to those smaller yards also is critical, and $400,000 to $475,000 a year over the three years of the program will be made available so smaller companies can compete for matching grants.
That aspect of the program will be run through the Maine Technology Institute, a non-profit agency largely funded by the state, which this past year awarded $6 million to 161 applicants, according to MTI President Betsy Biemann.
MTI’s mission is to encourage and promote research and development in technology-driven industries to create jobs. Under its rules, applicants must match 100 percent of the award they get and part of the new federal grant will be used for up to 75 percent of the applicant’s share.
“The matching funds available will stimulate more companies to apply for awards,” Biemann said “We’ll see quite a number of new companies step up.”
The grant will be coordinated out of Gov. John Baldacci’s Office of Redevelopment and Reemployment, which is working on the state’s response to the closure of the Naval Air Station in Brunswick.
Yancey-Wrona said the impact of the base closure on the Midcoast and the ongoing loss of jobs at Bath Iron Works were part of the grant application.
“Bath Iron Works is one of the largest boatbuilders in the world,” she said, and its workers have the skills needed to advance the boatbuilding and composite industry in the state. The impact of the grant goes beyond the Midcoast, however, and affects 11 of the state’s 16 counties, either through boatyards, composite companies or training facilities.
State officials are still trying to figure out the ties that bind the 13 regions that received the grants out of the 97 applications submitted.
In addition to Maine, grants were awarded to Northeast Pennsylvania; Upstate New York; Piedmont Triad North Carolina; Central Michigan; Western Michigan; Florida Panhandle; Western Alabama and Eastern Mississippi; North Central Indiana; Greater Kansas City; Denver Metro Region; Central and Eastern Montana; and, the California Coast.
By Victoria Wallack
A coalition of boatyards from Kennebunkport to Calais is celebrating the news that Maine is getting a $15 million federal grant to grow its boatbuilding industry and expand the use of new materials in the process.
The grant is coming from the federal Department of Labor and is part of a $195 million initiative by the Bush administration to encourage innovation and grow new regional economies and jobs that require skilled workers and pay good wages. Maine got word last week that it is receiving one of only 13 grants awarded throughout the country; it will provide $5 million a year over three years.
“It wasn’t done on politics,” said Stephen Von Vogt, chairman of the recently formed Maine Built Boats coalition. “We got it because we had such a novel idea and also boats are pretty cool.”
The grant will be spent developing new boatbuilding techniques and composite materials that make boats lighter and more durable; marketing Maine boats to a wider audience; training future boat builders through the University of Maine and Community College System; and providing capital for new or expanding businesses.
“We’re really good at this stuff,” said Von Vogt, ticking off names of famous Maine-made boats, including Morris, Hinckley and Hodgdon. “We’re right at the tipping point. If we reinvest in it and do it right, we can significantly grow the industry. If we do it wrong, we’ll take a bunch of money the feds hand us and we’ll end up with nothing.”
Von Vogt works for Hodgdon Yachts of East Boothbay and also runs a spin-off company in Portland to build a prototype of a high-speed boat made of high-tech composites commissioned by the Navy to transport Navy SEALS. He helped write the grant application along with others from the boatbuilding and composite industry and members of the state departments of Labor, Economic and Community Development and Education.
In some ways his company embodies the intention of the grant. It uses technology to come up with new materials and building methods; serves a high-end market niche; and hires a range of skilled workers, including some with master’s degrees in engineering.
Von Vogt said it was “stroke of genius” for the state to bring all the players together to work on the grant.
“It’s absolutely critical that industry be involved otherwise not one job will be created other than in Augusta, where there’s plenty of jobs already,” he said.
“If you talk to boatyards up and down the coast, they can’t hire enough qualified people in good, well-paying jobs,” Von Vogt said. “People who are training boat builders, they can’t fill their classes. There’s something wrong there.”
“One of the things we need desperately is an educated work-force,” agreed Martin Grimnes of Harbor Technologies in Brunswick, whose company makes piers and docks out of composites to replace steel and pressure-treated wood.
Grimnes, who also worked on the grant application, would like the state to develop the capacity to build composite commercial ferries and become the national leader in that market.
Building with composites, which include the traditional fiberglass, Kevlar, carbon fiber and more, is a growth industry even though fiberglass has been around for a long time, Grimnes said. Ferries made out of composites would be much more economical to run because they would be lighter, and the savings in fuel costs alone would make them a good investment, he said.
“The governor in his wisdom applied and competed for this grant and it had to focus on a growth industry. Composites is one of the targeted industries. It could have been bio-tech,” Grimnes said, but the state is building on a long tradition by marrying composites and boatbuilding.
Janet Yancey-Wrona of the Department of Economic and Community Development, said when grant applications were first announced in November, the governor’s office was challenged to decide “what has enough traction right now to really make it. We could have picked anything,” she said, but settled on boat building and composites because of Maine’s tradition of being a boatbuilding state.
Now the challenge will be to market the Maine brand, and part of the grant will be used for marketing materials, trade shows and displaying new products.
“Our small boatyards by themselves are not going to be competitive for major contracts,” Yancey-Wrona said, but the state can market itself as a boatbuilding and composite research hub.
Providing research and development funds to those smaller yards also is critical, and $400,000 to $475,000 a year over the three years of the program will be made available so smaller companies can compete for matching grants.
That aspect of the program will be run through the Maine Technology Institute, a non-profit agency largely funded by the state, which this past year awarded $6 million to 161 applicants, according to MTI President Betsy Biemann.
MTI’s mission is to encourage and promote research and development in technology-driven industries to create jobs. Under its rules, applicants must match 100 percent of the award they get and part of the new federal grant will be used for up to 75 percent of the applicant’s share.
“The matching funds available will stimulate more companies to apply for awards,” Biemann said “We’ll see quite a number of new companies step up.”
The grant will be coordinated out of Gov. John Baldacci’s Office of Redevelopment and Reemployment, which is working on the state’s response to the closure of the Naval Air Station in Brunswick.
Yancey-Wrona said the impact of the base closure on the Midcoast and the ongoing loss of jobs at Bath Iron Works were part of the grant application.
“Bath Iron Works is one of the largest boatbuilders in the world,” she said, and its workers have the skills needed to advance the boatbuilding and composite industry in the state. The impact of the grant goes beyond the Midcoast, however, and affects 11 of the state’s 16 counties, either through boatyards, composite companies or training facilities.
State officials are still trying to figure out the ties that bind the 13 regions that received the grants out of the 97 applications submitted.
In addition to Maine, grants were awarded to Northeast Pennsylvania; Upstate New York; Piedmont Triad North Carolina; Central Michigan; Western Michigan; Florida Panhandle; Western Alabama and Eastern Mississippi; North Central Indiana; Greater Kansas City; Denver Metro Region; Central and Eastern Montana; and, the California Coast.