Editor’s Note: This is one of several stories highlighting the challenges and innovations in training and recruiting workers for Central New York’s growth economy. Advance Media New York will bring together the Upstate New York workforce development community in Syracuse June 10 for the inaugural NY Workforce Connect conference. Registration is open.
Syracuse, N.Y. – After nearly seven years in the Army, Brenden Hall of North Syracuse wanted a civilian career but knew he did not want to go to college.
“I have a lot of family members with a construction background, so I just talked to them and decided I wanted to go into construction,” said Hall, 24. “I did a lot of research, and then I decided to go with the electrician route.”
Hall is one of 200 apprentices in the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 43’s apprenticeship program. Participants attend classes one day a week at the union’s training center in Clay. They work the rest of the week, earning a paycheck under the supervision of experienced electricians.
The union completed a $7 million classroom building in April that will allow it to double from 200 to 400 the number of apprentices it can train at the center on Waterhouse Road in Clay.
But that’s not enough to meet the increasing demand.
Local 43 business manager Alan Marzullo said he expects his union, which has 1,600 members, to quadruple to more than 6,000 workers within the next five years.
That’s why the union is already making plans to build an even bigger addition — a two-story, $17 million expansion — that will add more classrooms and hands-on training space to teach the next generation of union electricians.
Local 43 is among many Central New York trade unions, colleges and universities, industry and business groups, and medical organizations that are gearing up to train workers for what will be the biggest private development in the history of New York state.
Micron Technology Inc. is set to start construction this fall on a semiconductor fabrication plant that it says will cost $100 billion to build over 20 years and employ up to 9,000 people directly and more than 40,000 others at supply chain and other companies drawn to the area.
That means Central New York, which is already seeing strong job growth across multiple employment sectors, is going to need a lot more workers to fill jobs ranging from engineers to technicians to electricians, carpenters and plumbers.
And that’s just to fill the Micron jobs. Supply chain and other companies drawn to the area by Micron will need workforces of their own, ranging from business managers to accountants, and those workers will need support services, including medical care.
Micron’s arrival comes as construction projects at Syracuse University and the Oneida Indian Nation’s Turning Stone Resort Casino and Point Place Casino are also boosting the need for skilled workers often supplied by trade unions.
The state is also undertaking its biggest transportation project in history: tearing down part of Interstate 81 and rerouting highway traffic around the city.
At the same time, developers are building more apartments and hotels in anticipation of an increase in the area’s population — Micron estimates up to 64,000 new residents will be drawn to the region — and visitors.
Already, industry leaders are preparing. Syracuse University expects to invest $100 million in the next five years in workforce development. SUNY Upstate is offering free medical schooling to qualified Syracuse city graduates. The state has pledged to turn an old Sears department store just south of downtown into a training center for computer chip-making workers.
Timing over the next few years is key. The goal is to produce the new workers as the jobs open up, says Aimee Durfee, vice president of workforce innovation at the Syracuse-based economic development organization CenterState CEO.
“We’re doing things that are closely tied to the needs of industry,” Durfee said. “We don’t want to train people without a job being there when they complete the training.”
Unions grow
In October, the North Atlantic States Regional Council of Carpenters completed a $3.6 million expansion of its training center off Buckley Road. The addition grew the facility’s training space from 6,000 square feet to 18,000 square feet.
The expansion features 28-foot ceilings for training on how to erect scaffolding and rigging and build high concrete walls — skills that will be needed for the Micron project and many other developments.
Up to 500 carpenter apprentices and journeypersons from an area spanning from the Pennsylvania border to the Canadian border and from Herkimer County to Cayuga County train at the center each year. With the bigger facility, that number is expected to double.
In addition, Laborers Local 633 is planning to build a new training center on Fly Road in DeWitt.
Construction of the Micron facility will require up to 3,000 electricians, with another 600 expected to be part of Micron’s staff to help operate the factory once construction is complete, Marzullo said.
The first electricians will be needed at the site in the first or second quarters of 2026, he said.
Hall, the former soldier, said he was attracted to a career as an electrician because of the diversity of the work.
“We go somewhere different every day, do something different every day,” he said. “I didn’t want to go to the same place and do the same thing every day for the rest of my life.”
Matthew Espinosa, 26, of Baldwinsville, said he joined the union’s apprenticeship program because he wanted a job where he could “use my brain and my hands.”
He also likes the fact there are plenty of jobs available to pick from.
“I haven’t gone a day without work since I started, really,” he said.
Workers needed now
The Syracuse area has been seeing strong job growth even before the Micron project gets underway. In fact, it had the strongest job growth of any metro in New York in April, according to the state Department of Labor.
The area gained 5,800 jobs compared with the same month last year. That’s a growth rate of 1.9%. The next highest job growth rate occurred in New York City and Kingston, which both saw 1.5% gains.
Leading the state in the rate of job growth does not happen often for the Syracuse area. It has only occurred twice before in the last 33 years — in September 1992 and December of last year.
“We tended to be more in the middle range,” said Karen Knapik-Scalzo, an associate economist with the Department of Labor in Syracuse. “So it is notable that we are starting to pull ahead.”
She attributed the growth to a diversified employment base not dependent on any one industry. Most of the area’s industrial sectors are growing right now, including construction, professional and business services, private education and health services, and leisure and hospitality, she said.
“All bodes well for the Syracuse metro area right now,” Knapik-Scalzo said.
The area’s unemployment rate stood at just 3% in April, which was below the state’s overall jobless rate of 3.6% and the U.S. rate of 3.9%.
Will the area have enough workers to fill all the jobs that Micron is expected to bring?
Knapik-Scalzo thinks it can. But she said it will require ramping up the region’s workforce training programs.
“Many are already ramping up,” she said. “There’s already been a big push to expand.”
Homegrown vs. imported workers
CenterState’s Durfee said the area is likely to draw many workers from other parts of New York and the country to help fill the jobs that will come with Micron.
However, she said she would like to see as many local residents take those jobs as possible.
“We want to focus on ensuring the talent that lives here is prepared for the growth,” she said.
CenterState is partnering with Micron and Syracuse University on an initiative called the Future-Ready Workforce Innovation Consortium, consisting of 50 organizations including colleges, school districts, unions and trade organizations.
The consortium is working to ensure that the organizations’ training programs align with Micron’s construction and manufacturing needs. Once supply chain companies associated with Micron come to the area, the consortium will work to align training programs for their needs, too, Durfee said.
CenterState is also overseeing other programs designed to help people get jobs in construction and manufacturing.
Syracuse Pathways to Apprenticeship provides training to help local residents — particularly women, people of color and veterans — gain access to the building trades’ registered apprenticeship programs and prepare them for construction jobs. Since the program started four years ago, 158 people have gone through it.
A newer program, Syracuse Bridge to Manufacturing Careers, is based at the Westcott Community Center.
Participants meet with employment coaches to learn about manufacturing job opportunities and the skills they require, take tours of local manufacturers, receive help applying for tuition assistance and receive tutoring on basic math skills. Twelve people have gone through the pilot program so far.
Rosemary Avila, executive director of CNY Works, said she thinks the region can also help fill the new jobs by encouraging people who may have dropped out of the workforce during the coronavirus pandemic to rejoin it.
That may already be happening. There were 4,800 more people in the Syracuse area’s workforce in April than there were in the same month last year, according to the Department of Labor.
Avila said it’s likely some of those workers dropped out of the workforce during the pandemic and have come back into it after seeing the jobs that are available.
“I believe we’re on the right pathway,” she said.
CNY Works keeps lists of job openings in Central New York, explains to job seekers the credentials they’ll need for the jobs and in some cases pays for job training for them.
In addition to helping the unemployed find work, the nonprofit organization helps people who are underemployed — those who are in low-paying, often part-time jobs — move up to full-time, higher-paying jobs.
Modern manufacturing
The Manufacturers Association of Central New York operates three programs designed to draw young people into manufacturing fields.
Partners for Education & Business sends manufacturing representatives to local schools (Kindergarten through grade 12) to describe the benefits of manufacturing careers. It also brings students to manufacturing facilities for tours.
Colleen Blagg, manager of corporate and workforce development for MACNY, said one of the goals of the program is to dispel myths about what it’s like to work in a modern manufacturing facility.
“People have the impression that they’re low-skill, dirty jobs, and that’s just not the case,” she said. “They’re technical and they pay well. Micron’s cleanrooms are supposed to be cleaner than a hospital operating room.”
Real Life Rosies and Advance 2 Apprenticeship provide free training to women, people with disabilities and others underrepresented in the manufacturing sector.
The 12-week training program at Onondaga Community College and Mohawk Valley Community College prepares participants for manufacturing technician apprenticeship positions at local employers. More than 130 people have gone through the program since it launched in 2023.
Like the trade union programs, the apprenticeship programs at local manufacturers allow participants to earn a paycheck while receiving training.
“You’re earning while you’re learning,” Blagg said.
NY's workforce challenges and solutions
