YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – State and local officials gathered Thursday to mark the latest phase in the Mahoning Valley’s efforts to reinvent itself, with a ceremonial groundbreaking for the Youngstown Innovation Hub for Aerospace & Defense.
The state’s fourth innovation hub, which Gov. Mike DeWine designated in February 2025, is being established in the former Vindicator Printing Co. building, 107 Vindicator Square, which will be converted into 130,000 square feet of advanced manufacturing space following a $32.7 million renovation. The building is intended to help meet rising demand for advanced manufacturing incubation and acceleration space in Youngstown.
The ceremonial groundbreaking that took place Thursday represents more than just the start of the building renovation, said Megan Malara, director of the innovation hub. “It reflects what can happen when state, regional, industry, academic and community partners come together,” she said.
“This community has always been defined by its resilience, its work ethic and its ability to reinvent itself,” the Hubbard native said. “To now be a part of an effort that’s creating new opportunities for businesses, researchers, students and the next generation of manufacturing talent is both exciting and deeply rewarding for me.”
Barb Ewing, CEO of YBI, which will manage the renovated building, said the “true fresh start” for the Valley came in 2012, when America Makes – formerly known as the Additive Manufacturing Innovation Institute – opened. “Since then, we have been forging ahead into a new era of advanced manufacturing,” she said. “God knows that our path and our past hasn’t been easy, but it has made us who we are today.”
The $125 million Ohio Innovation Hubs Program awarded $26 million to the new innovation hub, which is being matched by a “very impressive” $36 million in local support, said Lydia Mihalik, director of the Ohio Department of Development. About $7 million of the hub program funds will go toward the renovation, while the rest will go to programing, according to a YBI spokeswoman.
“It’s probably not well known, but aerospace and defense and additive manufacturing is alive and well here in the Mahoning Valley,” Mihalik said. “The supply chain is very strong, and it’s only going to get better. In Ohio right now, we’re seeing a resurgence of manufacturing and a real new industrial revolution as it relates to aerospace and defense, and this is going to be a very important component of the entire state’s future moving forward.”
Local partners have about $11 million dollars in hand today, and approximately $11 million “in play,” Ewing said.
“We knew how much of a catalyst this investment here in this community could be,” Mihalik said. “And it’s not just about business. It’s really about people, and it’s giving people a chance and an opportunity to, as the governor likes to say, live up to their God-given potential.”
Among the state agencies lending a hand with establishing the hub was the Ohio Department of Natural Resources. Even before the downtown building was designated as an innovation hub, ODNR had secured $1.2 million from the federal Abandoned Mine Land Economic Revitalization Program, which supports economic revitalization in areas impacted by coal mining.
Mahoning County had more than 270 mining sites in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, ODNR Director Mary Mertz said.
“You need those early dollars to bring in all the other dollars, and we’re really proud we were able to do that, and you were able to use them so effectively,” she said. “It took a lot of creativity. It took a lot of persuasion to make sure our federal partners would approve it.”
Lt. Gov Jim Tressel, who served as head coach of Youngstown State University’s championship-winning football team and later as YSU’s president, pointed to 2012 as being “about when the march for the whole state of Ohio really began to accelerate.” That was the year after then-Gov. John Kasich and the General Assembly established JobsOhio, the state’s public-private economic development partner.
Tressel and others during the program took note that CNBC recently identified Ohio as the No. 1 state for business, up from 34th in 2011.
“What the governor is most proud of is that there are events like this going on all over the state,” he said. “The future of the state of Ohio is so bright.”
Among the local funding partners was the city of Youngstown, which committed $1.35 million to replace a shortfall when expected federal funding did not come through.
Councilman Julius Oliver, 1st Ward, said the hub could “change the face of the city” but acknowledged council members might hesitate at the $1.35 million request. He credited state Rep. Lauren McNally of Youngstown, D-58th, a former City Council colleague, with keeping him informed so he could keep his fellow council members updated.
As the steel titans of the past contributed to building Youngstown and helping defend the nation, the companies that will operate out of the hub are “going to be something that can put the city of Youngstown back to work and defend our country in the future,” he said.
The recently approved state capital budget included $750,000 for the hub. Ewing credited state Sen. Al Cutrona of Canfield, R-33rd, for helping secure those funds.
She reported that he called her from his car when he was driving to Columbus to talk to DeWine and Mihalik – without being asked to intervene – when efforts to raise the local match encountered political headwinds.
Cutrona credited the work of his colleagues in the legislature, including McNally and Reps. Nick Santucci of Niles, R-64th, and Tex Fischer of Boardman, R-59th.
“We saw this as an opportunity to move the Valley forward. We see this as the future,” he remarked.
“Our grandparents built the steel that built America, and now we’re building the technology that’s going to shape America’s future, so think about that,” McNally said. “The kids who are in elementary school today could someday walk into this building for their first job, launch a company here, discover a new technology here or build something that changes the world, and they’ll do it right here in Youngstown, and that’s what today is really about.
“It’s hope. It’s confidence. It’s believing that the next generation shouldn’t have to leave home to chase opportunity. They should be able to build that opportunity right here,” she continued.
“Aerospace and defense is the future of our state of Ohio, and we have a very, very significant importance in history of being a part of that industry,” Santucci said. “With the Youngstown Air Reserve Station right up the street, with NASA Glenn an hour away, and all of our military bases throughout the state of Ohio, companies are going to look at the Youngstown-Warren market, and they’re also going to look at the Lake to River region about bringing their supply chain here. They’re going to tap into this facility that we’re standing in front of.”
The first companies should be moving into the building in about a year, Ewing predicted. Renovations to the building’s roof will begin this summer, when demolition work should get underway as well.
Strollo Architects is the project architect. DeSalvo Construction is the general contractor.
“In the fall, we will kick off the actual renovations – you know, rebuilding the infrastructure inside, upgrading the electrical, getting HVAC inside, all of those types of things,” Ewing said. “So probably about a year. We’re hopeful. It depends on a lot of different things.”
She predicted the hub would generate 450 jobs, including 150 in the building itself.
The hub will offer various resources to assist incoming companies, Malara said. Companies in advanced manufacturing and additive manufacturing need things like compressed air, three-phase power and argon dewars to perform tasks under controlled environments.
“One of the barriers to entry for advanced manufacturing companies is really getting that facility to the place that they need,” she said. “All of that’s going to be considered and built into this space, so that a business doesn’t have to make that investment to get started.”
In addition, the hub will offer some shared-use equipment, “so some of the larger purchase items that have applicability across companies may be housed here, as they are elsewhere on this innovation campus, so that companies can leverage those at a lower barrier to entry,” she said.
“We have a slew of partners that are on board to help businesses attract business, attract customers, get integrated into places into the aerospace and defense supply chain, and really dollars to help them move their technology out of lab scale into commercialization opportunities,” she added.
“When we look back on this in 10, 20 years, when we’re celebrating all of the incredible achievements that are happening out of this innovation hub, we’re going to be very proud and very grateful that a group of community-led and minded people got down, put their shoulder into it and never gave up, and what we did was we believed in you,” Mihalik said.
Pictured at top: Megan Malara, director of the Youngstown Innovation Hub for Aerospace & Defense, said the new hub will amplify the amount of space available to bring advanced manufacturing companies into the region.