| Reprinted with Permission New Orleans City
Business
July 24, 2006
Textron Marine & Land Systems was flushed
from its Chef Menteur Highway facility after Hurricane Katrina dumped 14 feet
of water onto its property. Textron builds armored secured vehicles designed
to protect the U.S. military from roadside explosions and also upgrades and restores
fleet craft for the U.S. Navy under a Landing Craft Air Cushion Service Life Extension
Program. Textron has moved back into its Chef Menteur facility. It now
employs 1,200 people at four facilities in Orleans Parish and Slidell and has
a two-year lease for office space at the New Orleans Regional Business Park in
eastern New Orleans. "Immediately after Katrina, we made the decision
to stay," said Thomas Walmsley, vice president and general manager of Textron.
"Right now, we’re committed to the New Orleans area." Textron
is part of Textron Systems based in Wilmington, Mass. The parent company is Providence,
R.I.-based Textron Inc. Publicly traded Textron Inc. also owns the companies that
make E-Z-Go golf carts and Cessna aircraft. Nearly all Textron’s
customers are military. The company makes a range of products for the Coast Guard
and other military branches. Textron’s top project now is the M1117
Guardian Armored Security Vehicle. For approximately five years, the company has
had a $500-million Army contract to produce 1,118 vehicles. Approximately 400
are complete with about 700 still to be produced. Textron is producing
48 vehicles a month, the highest production rate ever for the company. The
Iraqi government recently bought 63 vehicles for its police force, Walmsley said.
The vehicles are made entirely in New Orleans. The steel hulls are welded,
painted, sandblasted and covered with a protective lining at the Chef Menteur
site. The completed hulls are then put on a trailer and shipped across the U.S.
Highway 11 bridge to Slidell, where wheels and axles are installed. From Slidell,
they go to South Carolina before being shipped to purchasers. New administrative
home Textron is relocating its flooded administrative offices from
Chef Menteur to the business park’s 130-square-foot Enterprise Center on
Old Gentilly Road. Textron will lease 28,000 square feet for $7.50 a square foot.
Meyers Warehouse Inc. takes up nearly all the remaining space in the building
although the business park does have some office space. Textron employees
have been moving during July even though construction wasn’t quite finished.
Eighty-one employees will be in the building by the end of July, said David Whitaker,
Textron manager of public relations/communications. Eugene Green, president
of the business park, said Textron’s decision to remain in New Orleans after
Katrina is cause for celebration. "They had a lot of options. I’m
going to leave it like that. A firm of that nature would have been approached
by a lot of people interested in having them," Green said. "The bottom
line is that that’s a division of a multibillion-dollar international conglomerate
that has chosen to stay here in the city of New Orleans and has located in a place
where they think it’s going to be conducive to hiring more managers. That
bodes well for the future of New Orleans and Louisiana." Overcoming
Katrina Textron, like many other businesses post-Katrina, is dealing
with increased employee attrition, Walmsley said. Textron’s attrition is
more than 50 percent annually, he said. "Is that ever going to stop?"
he said. "That means every two years we replace everybody. There’s a
cost associated with bringing in and training 50 percent of your work force every
year." Walmsley fears a worker shortage could lead to bidding wars
in the metro area. Textron’s ASV military customers will simply have
to continue to deal with a company hit hard by hurricane. Textron’s production
halted thanks to Katrina’s damage to the Chef Menteur facility, which is
outside the levee system. "Anything 14 feet or down was destroyed.
The walls were done, the offices were gone, everything in them was gone,"
Walmsley said. Production was set back for roughly four months, he said.
The Chef Menteur facility has been rebuilt and production returned to pre-Katrina
levels roughly two months ago. The Army is concerned about how Textron
will prevent future hurricane problems, Walmsley said. Equipment will be higher
off the ground and moved into areas inside levees, he said. "But
you know if we get hit with another Katrina there’s nothing you can do,"
he said. Textron is growing so fast, it is running out of space at its
two facilities in eastern New Orleans and two in Slidell, he said. "It’s
a really tough way to run a business, spread out all over the place," he
said. The company is working with state officials to consolidate all four
facilities at one site, he said. The North Shore is a possibility although "we’d
probably have to keep some of it here (in New Orleans)," he said. The
company spent more than $50 million on equipment, payroll, housing and other expenses
to restart after Katrina. The company leased 93 lots in Lacombe to provide
225 Federal Emergency Management Agency trailers for workers, he said. Roughly
70 families are still living there, he said. The company is hoping to
recoup some money from the federal government, he said. Still, the future
looks bright for Textron. "The good news is the government has a
five-year budget. We’re in that five-year budget," he said. That
means Textron will continue making the armored vehicles for at least five more
years, he said. "The nice thing about our portfolio is we always
seem like we’ve got something hitting and going on. That makes your business
a lot more stable," he said | 
