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Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news. It is Bloomberg Business Weekdaily.

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Speaker 1: That's Carol Master. I'm Tim Steneveek. On the Brooklyn Waterfront

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Speaker 1: sandwich between South Williamsburg and Dumbo, bordering Fort Green, you

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Speaker 1: can find the Brooklyn Navy Yard. It's three hundred acres.

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Speaker 1: It's an industrial park. It's home to more than five

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Speaker 1: hundred and fifty businesses and employees eleven thousand people. The

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Speaker 1: businesses do and according to the Navy Yard, it generates

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Speaker 1: more than two point five billion dollars per year in

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Speaker 1: economic impact for the city. Now, before it was home

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Speaker 1: to firms and medtech, green tech, materials and more, it

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Speaker 1: was a shipbuilding site that built and launched ships including

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Speaker 1: the USS Main, USS Arizona, and USS Missouri. Is such

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Speaker 1: a great history, right, It's pretty cool. Yeah, it's really cool.

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Speaker 1: Back with us here in the studio is Lindsay Green.

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Speaker 1: She's president and CEO of the Brooklyn at Navy Yard. Lindsay,

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Speaker 1: good to see you, welcome back, Thank you. You know

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Speaker 1: you were in here over a year ago. I couldn't

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Speaker 1: believe it had been that long. Actually, when I was

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Speaker 1: looking at the notes from our producer ari A lot

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Speaker 1: has changed in the narrative around manufacturing in the United

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Speaker 1: States since you were last with us. Just to contextualize this,

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Speaker 1: Joe Biden was running against Donald Trump when you were

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Speaker 1: last in our office, you know, so it was a

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Speaker 1: completely different world. The President won the election, he's talked

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Speaker 1: about bringing manufacturing back to the United States. Talk about

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Speaker 1: manufacturing in the context of what's happening in the Brooklyn

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Speaker 1: Navy Yard, because you are a big believer that manufacturing

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Speaker 1: needs to happen in cities.

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Speaker 2: It does. It needs to happen all over the country,

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Speaker 2: and we believe that there's a slice of it that

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Speaker 2: always makes sense to happen in urban settings. And that's

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Speaker 2: what the Navy has been about since the Navy started.

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Speaker 2: And it's really about businesses who capitalize on the talent

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Speaker 2: that is here in New York in particular, and that's

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Speaker 2: both shop floor workers and talented engineers of different types

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Speaker 2: and a proximity to their customer base. That's big corporations

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Speaker 2: that are based here, the eight and a half million consumers.

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Speaker 2: Just being in a big metropolis is a great place

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Speaker 2: to see and feel the applicability of whatever it is

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Speaker 2: that you make. And so that's what a lot of businesses.

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Speaker 2: That's why they want to be attracted to when they

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Speaker 2: locate at the yard and we offer them a home

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Speaker 2: base to do that.

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Speaker 3: Remind us about the manufacturing that is at the yard.

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Speaker 2: So the yard is home to a wide variety of

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Speaker 2: manufacturing businesses. They do everything from ingredients for food companies

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Speaker 2: to custom couture and fashion like La Fayette one forty eight,

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Speaker 2: to people making electric motorcycles, medical device companies. We have

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Speaker 2: a still functioning shipyard. They're using the infrastructure that the

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Speaker 2: Navy built. That's GMD Shipyard. Kind of pretty much everything

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Speaker 2: you think of sort of like mining.

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Speaker 1: They're not building iPhones and they're not selling soccer balls,

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Speaker 1: and they're not making shoes.

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Speaker 2: No, it tends to be high value things that require

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Speaker 2: the talent and can candidly justify the expense of operating

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Speaker 2: inside a big city. Or it is things that are

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Speaker 2: directly consumed by the big metropolis that we are all

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Speaker 2: a part of.

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Speaker 4: Is that the reality of manufacturing in the US, it's

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Speaker 4: got to be a higher end manufacturer. I mean, we

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Speaker 4: kind of talk about this when when certainly the President

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Speaker 4: stress is bringing manufacturing back to.

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Speaker 1: The which he wants iPhones built in the US, Yes,

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Speaker 1: and can.

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Speaker 3: We at some point.

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Speaker 2: Possibly It requires a lot of runway and investment, because

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Speaker 2: that is just a whole set of skills from the

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Speaker 2: types of plants, the type of machinery use in an

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Speaker 2: iPhone plant, the type of skills that workers in an

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Speaker 2: iPhone plant have.

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Speaker 3: Why don't we have those skills here?

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Speaker 2: We, I think, just stopped investing in them decades ago,

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Speaker 2: all across the country. It changed our education system, it

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Speaker 2: changed the way businesses invested their money, and a lot

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Speaker 2: of that expertise and new manufacturing techniques just located overseas.

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Speaker 3: What are those skills though?

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Speaker 4: So it's the type and I think I think we

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Speaker 4: have like this old a lot of us. Maybe it's

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Speaker 4: me guilty as charged in terms of what manufacturing is today.

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Speaker 3: So educate us.

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Speaker 2: So it's it's high tech. You have to be very

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Speaker 2: computer literate, but not really any more computer or literate

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Speaker 2: than the rest of us. Have to be at a

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Speaker 2: function in daily life, but you have to have a

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Speaker 2: familiarity with it because something that you used to do

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Speaker 2: with your hands as a trades scraftsman is now done

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Speaker 2: with a machine, and you have to know how the

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Speaker 2: machine is using that same skill set, but it means

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Speaker 2: that a worker's safety risk is much lower because they're

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Speaker 2: not putting their hands or other body parts in tiny places,

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Speaker 2: and they can work much faster. So it allows them

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Speaker 2: to be economically competitive and keep up with the heavily

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Speaker 2: automated factories that might exist elsewhere. So it's principally that

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Speaker 2: you're doing the same thing. You have to have the

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Speaker 2: same mental training because sometimes the machines break. You have

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Speaker 2: to be able to triage and troubleshoot. But you need

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Speaker 2: to know how to work in both the analog and

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Speaker 2: the new high tech environment. And it's hard to tell

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Speaker 2: that story. And most manufacturers are so focused day in

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Speaker 2: and day out on producing the thing they make. They're

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Speaker 2: not marketing the sexiness of what it is that they do.

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Speaker 2: They're marketing their thing, and it's hard to expect them

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Speaker 2: to do both. So it's storytelling that we take on

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Speaker 2: at the Navy Yard because it's about our mission and

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Speaker 2: supports what they're doing.

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Speaker 1: On Sunday, Governor Kathy Hockle endorsed Zorn Mandani to be

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Speaker 1: the next mayor of New York City. I said, we're

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Speaker 1: at interesting times right now, compared to when we last

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Speaker 1: spoke with you. I know that Mondanni is going out

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Speaker 1: and reaching out to a lot of business leaders and

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Speaker 1: meeting with them. Have you had a chance to speak

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Speaker 1: with him?

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Speaker 2: I have not. No, I'm aware of his campaign. Obviously.

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Speaker 2: I serve at the pleasure of Mayor Adams, and what

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Speaker 2: we do is I think a boon for all everyone

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Speaker 2: in the city.

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Speaker 1: Do you would your job change? Would you would it

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Speaker 1: be likely that you would? He would bring somebody new in.

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Speaker 2: It's up to him. I'm an appointed position, just like

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Speaker 2: most other agency heads. It is city property and it's

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Speaker 2: about good news for the people of New York.

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Speaker 1: I just wanted to ask about the New York City

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Speaker 1: economy because you have such a good view of it.

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Speaker 1: How would you characterize it right now?

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Speaker 2: I'd say, like most New Yorkers, like businesses here, are

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Speaker 2: built to grind it out and hustle and get it done,

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Speaker 2: and that's what you see people doing. The tariffs have

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Speaker 2: an impact, I think principally on the uncertainty level right now,

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Speaker 2: but they also have had an impact on how people

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Speaker 2: manage their inventory and how they plan. I think some

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Speaker 2: folks are feeling pinched, but they're getting by. It's painful,

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Speaker 2: But I.

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Speaker 4: Want to talk about the people who feel pinched because

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Speaker 4: we're going to talk about New York housing in just

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Speaker 4: a moment. It's expensive, yes, and we're not even talking

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Speaker 4: about ownership, we're talking about renting.

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Speaker 3: And I'm just curious.

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Speaker 4: So many of the people who work at the Navy Yard,

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Speaker 4: who are manufacturing, what kind of jobs are these?

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Speaker 3: Are they well paying jobs?

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Speaker 4: Are they jobs that give you an easy life in

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Speaker 4: New York City or you're living outside New York City.

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Speaker 2: For a true I think production employee, it's a really

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Speaker 2: good life, sustaining wage. It is a traditional middle class job.

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Speaker 2: You can support your family with these wages, and there's lots.

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Speaker 3: Of researching in New York City.

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Speaker 2: Living in New York City, yes, you know not you

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Speaker 2: don't make as much as you do as a tech

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Speaker 2: worker or someone with degrees, but you can do well here.

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Speaker 2: And that's why we support it and try to make

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Speaker 2: sure that as the jobs get more high tech, they're

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Speaker 2: still super excited simple to someone with the high school education.

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Speaker 2: It's why we have the Steam Center, and it's why

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Speaker 2: we connect adults to some of these advanced machinery trainings.

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Speaker 1: What's vacancy look like there right now.

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Speaker 2: Vacancy is generally low. We are pretty occupied, but we

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Speaker 2: always have room for new people.

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Speaker 1: Where does it compare with other parts of your tenure?

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Speaker 2: As far as I know, the Navy Yard's always done

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Speaker 2: a pretty good job being occupied. The only time it's

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Speaker 2: been higher, it's because we didn't have a chance to

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Speaker 2: renovate a building the Navy had built and it maybe

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Speaker 2: had a tree growing through it.

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Speaker 3: Tenants who come in, they stay.

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Speaker 2: Yes, very much. It's part of our special sauce that

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Speaker 2: we help tenants grow. And you know, we call it

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Speaker 2: the Swiss Cheese of moving people around between different buildings

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Speaker 2: in different different spaces as they grow. Sometimes we bring

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Speaker 2: them all back together. Sometimes they have one set of

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Speaker 2: operations in one building and a different set of operations

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Speaker 2: than another. It's we make it work for them. We

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Speaker 2: have an ecosystem, we have a campus. We want them

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Speaker 2: to succeed and run their business and employee Yorkers, and

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Speaker 2: we do what we can to help them do that.

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Speaker 1: And there's also some good food there. I'll just throw

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Speaker 1: it out there.

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Speaker 2: There's good food. There's there's good you get good food.

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Speaker 2: There's good twenty one plus beverages.

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Speaker 1: Also, Lindsay, always good to see you. Thanks so much

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Speaker 1: to see you, Thanks for hearing at the studio. Lindsay Green,

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Speaker 1: President and CEO of the Brooklyn Navy Yard,