Two Years after Sandy Landfall, Commerce Continues to Help Affected Communities
Commerce Blog
October 29, 2014
In the two years since Hurricane Sandy made landfall on October 29, 2012, the Department of Commerce, through its National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Economic Development Administration (EDA), Census Bureau, National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), and National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), has been working to help communities recover and enhance resiliency in the face of future storms.
Hours after the storm hit, NOAA’s National Geodetic Survey began aerial survey missions to assess storm damage. In total, 1649 miles of coastline were documented. The photos taken on these missions provided emergency and coastal managers with the information they needed to develop recovery strategies, facilitate search-and-rescue efforts, identify hazards to navigation and HAZMAT spills, locate errant vessels, and provide documentation home and business owners needed to assess damages to property. To date, FEMA has used the NOAA-supplied photos, as well as those from the Civil Air Patrol, to determine damage to 35,000 homes.
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When I was growing up, manufacturing work was all about having a strong back and a strong work ethic. These days, manufacturing has changed. The first Friday in October each year marks 
If you build it, they will come. But what if it’s built and no one knows it? In the United States, there are hundreds of millions of square feet of nonproductive commercial, industrial, and manufacturing space. This space provides an opportunity for domestic companies to find manufacturing spaces as well as foreign companies looking to locate operations in the United States. However, information about this space can be incomplete and scattered. That’s where NEXCAP comes in.
The importance of manufacturing to the American economy is undeniable. Economic development is crucial to supporting manufacturing communities (and vice versa), and the work many of you do to build infrastructure or develop the local workforce is contributing to the growth of manufacturing across the country. But manufacturing is changing, and its future looks nothing like its history. Rather than focus on offshoring or even “reshoring”—a term used to describe the return of manufacturing to developed markets as wages rise in emerging ones—today’s manufacturing strategies need to concentrate on what’s coming next. The synopsis below is adapted from “
Manufacturing built many parts of this country. It created hundreds of jobs and enabled the birth of the middle class. But over the years, some manufacturing communities have seen decline due to outsourcing or changes in the market. Yet, through the fluctuations and changes, the sense of pride in American manufacturing hasn’t diminished. Today, manufacturing is experiencing a renaissance in the United States. Companies are bringing operations back to the U.S., entrepreneurs are bringing new products to market, and the industry is evolving to and adapting to new technologies. Manufacturing is creating jobs – jobs that are high-paying. But, it’s also helping the economy. For every $1.00 spent in manufacturing, the sector generates $1.32 for the U.S. economy. EDA understands the crucial importance of manufacturing to the economic recovery and to future economic growth.