WARREN, Ohio — From time to time, you see a story about a new industry coming to a city in desperate need of an economic jolt. Look closely, and sometimes you see that the real story is about less companies and jobs and more about the heart and soul of the city and her people.
“This city has always found a way to punch back well above its weight class, no matter what obstacles or setbacks have been thrown our way, ” Mayor Doug Franklin brags from his office located in a Victorian Italianate mansion filled with marble fireplaces, elaborate woodwork, and the tragic family history of its original owner, civic leader Henry Bishop Perkins.
Last week Franklin stood alongside Hyperion Motors CEO Angelo Kafantaris at the Tech Belt Energy Innovation Center where Kafantaris, a Warren native, signed an agreement with the city to locate their engineers and IT workers for their new engineering hub.
Hyperion is developing a hydrogen fuel cell car along with the needed fueling network. Kafantaris says his plan is to bring production of the car side to the Mahoning Valley—not as an act of charity for a town feeling the pinch in the loss of the nearby GM plant, but because of the work ethic that defines the people in the region.
“For now, engineering operations will be based at the Warren energy incubator, with a focus on engineering and design on the car side. Our goal is to revolutionize the alternative-fuel car industry, in a place that has been historically at the forefront of every industrial revolution this country has had. We know how to take what is new and run with it,” Kafantaris says.
Warren has indeed been at the forefront of America’s innovative spirit. It was here in the town’s historic public square that the city become the first town in the United States to have electric street illumination.
That illumination was provided by the Packard Electric Company, namesake of Warren natives William and James Packard. They founded not only the electric company that manufactured incandescent carbon arc lamps, but also the Packard Motor Car Company.
Their sister Alaska Packard Davidson would become the first female FBI special agent.
Mayor Franklin has his own firsts to be proud of. He was the first one in his family to go to college and the first African American in Warren to run and win the office of the mayor.
“I grew up in the Southeast side of town. It was low-income public housing. Then fortunately we were able to move up to a better neighborhood with the full employment of my mom when she started working at Delphi Packard and my dad found better opportunities working in the steel mill,” he says.
“My family is an example of earning the American Dream.”
Back in the seventies, Franklin explains, there was no urgency for any local kid to go to college. “Because we had steel mills, the auto plant —Delphi Packard Electric was up and running at the time and GM Lordstown was just coming into its own. There were also several small steel fabricating plants and about 12,000 jobs out there in total. So, you could pretty much choose your path.”
Franklin, though, was fortunate. He had some teachers, he says, who “saw something more in me than I saw in myself. And my path went to college. I’m grateful for that.”
He went to Kent State University and graduated with a degree in political science. Then he came back home for a summer job making cars. “And then I decided to stay on. And I was making a pretty good wage, obviously, moreso than a lot of college graduates at that time who were struggling to find work in their respective fields. So, I came home. I continued working at General Motors and started my family.”
Today he says, “There’s so much value in being able to stay in your own community with your family and friends. It’s worth more than money. It’s priceless.”
His political career sprouted when he first ran for precinct committee person and won. Then ward councilman, then councilman at large, rising up to become the city council president.
“And then I was the former mayor’s safety service director (which is the equivalent of a city manager) for eight years prior to becoming mayor.” He’s finishing his second four-year term now and is running for a third.
Franklin is a Democrat, but he is not much of an ideologue or a partisan. You won’t see him refusing to meet with Republicans of any stripes like other mayors like to do. He knows he is in his job to manage a city, not to divide or pick and choose on party lines.
“My job is to get things done. As a mayor we can’t be restricted by party identity. We have to perform. We have to provide those services. And that’s what being a mayor is all about. I work as easily with Sen. Sherrod Brown as I do with Sen. Rob Portman,” he said.
“And Mike DeWine!” he exclaims. “Even as attorney general, our relationship was solidified. He came and we worked very well together and that’s continued with his role as governor. But the point is, as mayor, you can’t look at party. You don’t have that luxury. You have to perform. You have to deliver every single day. Because they’ve seen me at the grocery store, the library, the mall, the hospital, and I have to answer to everyone.”
The drive east out of Warren takes you past the now-shuttered Lordstown plant. At its peak, 4,000 men and women worked there, including Franklin. Those jobs provided for families. Today, no cars or trucks were entering or leaving the iconic GM plant.
If Warren, Ohio, teaches us anything it’s that a place is more than what closed down, or what used to be. Instead Warren’s story is in its possibilities, just like the possibilities men like Franklin went out and earned. Just ask Kafantaris.
“It is in the DNA of the people of Warren to be on the forefront of innovation, it is in our work ethic, it is in our ideas. This is not about coming back, it is about getting ahead.”
