12/9/08 Bend
 
By Doug Johnson
 
Only three other cities in Oregon have more manufacturing plants than Bend. That's according to a study of top industrial Oregon cities, put out by Manufacturers' News Inc., a directory which gathers statistics and databases for all 50 states. Data on Oregon cities was collected between October 2007 and October 2008. Bend, ranked tenth, has 200 manufacturing plants with 4,900 jobs. Hillsboro has fewer plants, one hundred and eighty seven, but around twenty four thousand five hundred manufacturing jobs, almost twenty thousand more than Bend.
 
"You take Portland for example, you've got 16,000 people working at Intel alone, we just don't have anywhere close to that in our area," says Roger Lee, Executive Director at Economic Development for Central Oregon.
 
Other Oregon cities, like Albany also have fewer plants than Bend, but plants there are larger, and therefore offer more jobs. Some of the largest plants in Bend are Cessna Aircraft, Jeld-Wen windows and the Deschutes Brewery. Last month Cessna announced 165 layoffs starting in January 2009. Lee says despite layoffs at Cessna and else where, the manufacturing industry in Central Oregon remains strong. He believes because they are not involved with the failing housing markets.
 
"I think we've got firms here that are in good sectors that will continue to perform and out perform the rest of the market," Lee says.