Kasich: Manufacturing coming alive

BATAVIA, Ohio - Ohio Gov. John Kasich, visited Batavia Thursday afternoon for a ribbon cutting at Altimet, an aluminum ingot plant that's a division of Global Scrap Management of Milford.

Altimet is located inside part of the old Ford Transmission plant in Batavia.

"It's exciting to be here.  I'm excited anytime I'm in a facility like this because this is the kind of facility that my family worked in and it means that there's a sign here the signpost says that manufacturing is coming alive," said Kasich.

Altimet has been in operation for more than a month and is operating around the clock to meet the demand for the purified aluminum that goes out the door.  Altimet takes in scrap and melts it down to create large ingots and small pellets.

"Most aluminum scrapped from this area which is nearly 250 million pounds per year now has the opportunity to stay here," said GSM's president Chris Hamm.

Hamm plans to add more furnaces to increase his output to roughly 220 million pounds per year.

The governor also used the ribbon cutting ceremony to sign an executive order creating the Office of Workforce Transformation.

The office, which will report directly to the governor, will oversee the 77 different workforce programs across 13 state agencies.

The federal and state money that funds workforce programs around the state will now be controlled by the new office.

"This is a very first big step in trying to align everything that we have in the state of Ohio so people can be successful, our schools can be successful and our kids can have a vision of where they need to go," said Kasich.