A manufacturer siting a plant asks three workforce questions in order. Can we hire the skilled trades we need. Can we train the people we hire. Will they still be here in five years.
Most regional pitches answer the first with a population figure and skip the other two. The second one is where Buffalo Niagara has something specific to point at, and the third is where the money is, because half the training cost is recoverable.
How does Buffalo Niagara train for advanced manufacturing?
Through the Northland Workforce Training Center, a dedicated facility on Buffalo’s East Side that trains for advanced manufacturing and energy occupations in partnership with regional employers and local colleges.
It is not a general community college program with a manufacturing elective. The training targets the roles employers are hiring for, the employers have input into the curriculum, and it sits inside an industrial corridor being redeveloped for industrial use rather than converted to something else.
What a manufacturer can actually use here:
- Northland, for advanced manufacturing and energy occupations, including a mechatronics program run with Erie Community College.
- 19 colleges and universities in the region, graduating more than 20,000 students a year, with 47 institutions inside a 100-mile radius.
- E-TIP, New York’s Employee Training Incentive Program, a tax credit worth 50 percent of eligible training costs up to $10,000 per employee.
- Be in Buffalo Recruiter Tools, free job posting and candidate reach for employers with no local employer brand yet.
Why mechatronics is the part worth noticing
Mechatronics sits across mechanical, electrical and control systems. It is the profile a modern plant actually needs and the single hardest one to hire, because it does not come out of a traditional single-discipline program. Northland’s mechatronics program is run with Erie Community College, and it has been covered in detail as one of the region’s in-demand technical fields.
The reason this matters more than a headcount figure: a region with a large labor pool and no pipeline for your specific trade is a harder hire than a smaller region with a program aimed at it. A training center built around employer demand is something you can plug into. A labor statistic is not.
The model has drawn attention beyond Western New York. Site Selection Magazine wrote it up as the Northland model, and its focus on students who need a route into the trades is the part other regions have studied.
The corridor around it
Northland anchors the redevelopment of the Northland Corridor, a stretch of East Side Buffalo that was industrial, emptied out, and is being rebuilt for industry. A nonprofit developer has led that work, which is unusual and is part of why the model travels.
For a manufacturer the practical point is that training capacity sits next to industrial space, in a corridor zoned and being redeveloped for industrial use. The workforce and the site are in the same place. Progress on the center and its effect on the surrounding East Side economy have both been covered locally.
Garwood Medical Devices is moving to Northland Avenue, which is the pattern working as intended. A growing company chose the corridor because of what is being built there, not despite it.
Free and confidential
Tell us the roles and the headcount.
We come back with the training funds, the institutions and the introductions.
What the training money actually is
Two mechanisms are worth knowing before you site anything, and the first one is more generous than most regional pitches bother to explain.
E-TIP, the Employee Training Incentive Program. New York State provides a tax credit equal to 50 percent of eligible training costs, up to $10,000 per employee who completes eligible training. It also covers approved internship programs in advanced technology, life sciences, software development and clean energy, at 50 percent of the intern stipend up to $3,000 per intern. The eligibility rules and the credit amounts are published by the New York State Department of Taxation and Finance, and the application runs through Empire State Development. Credits are issued after the approved training is completed, so this is a reimbursement mechanism rather than an upfront grant, and it needs to be in the plan before you train rather than claimed afterwards.
The intern component is the part companies miss. If you are standing up a US operation and want to build a pipeline rather than poach one, a funded internship program in exactly the fields Northland and the universities produce is a cheaper route than competing on salary from day one.
Department of Labor workforce services. New York’s Department of Labor administers workforce development services including training built around a specific employer’s needs. Our team handles the applications for both at no cost.
The honest limit
A training center does not eliminate a hard hire. If you need forty machinists in six months, no region hands them to you, and any organization that tells you otherwise is selling.
What it changes is the shape of the problem. It moves you from hoping the right people happen to live nearby to working with an institution whose job is producing them, with a state credit covering half the training cost, and a partner handling the paperwork. If you want that mapped against your own roles, start a confidential conversation and we will do it at no cost.
Questions manufacturers ask
How many graduates does the region produce a year?
More than 20,000 across 19 colleges and universities in Buffalo Niagara, with 47 institutions inside a 100-mile radius. The number that matters to you is not the total though, it is how many are in your specific fields, and we can pull that by discipline.
Can we influence what gets taught?
At Northland, employers have input into the curriculum, which is the whole design premise. That is a different relationship from recruiting out of a program somebody else designed.
What does the training credit actually cover?
50 percent of eligible training costs up to $10,000 per employee, plus 50 percent of an intern stipend up to $3,000 per intern for approved internship programs. It is a credit claimed after the training is completed, not cash upfront.
Will the people we train stay?
Retention is a cost-of-living question as much as a training one. The region’s housing and commute costs are low relative to comparable metros, which is what keeps graduates from being priced out to somewhere else. We can provide the cost-of-living comparison against any market you are weighing.
We need engineers, not trades. Does this apply?
Different pipeline, same answer. The region has three engineering schools including the University at Buffalo, and the annual graduate flow includes software development, electrical engineering, mechanical engineering and electronics. The manufacturing sector page has the detail.
Where to take this
If workforce is the criterion your site decision turns on, the useful next step is specific rather than general. Tell us the roles, the headcount and the timeline, and we will come back with the institutions producing those skills, the training funds that apply to your case, and an introduction to the people who run the relevant programs.
Free and confidential, whether or not you choose the region. See the region’s workforce and education picture, or how advanced manufacturers operate here.