Senator Collins Speaks at Groundbreaking for American Steel & Aluminum Manufacturing Facility Expansion in Saco

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SACO, ME - Today, U.S. Senator Susan Collins delivered remarks at a groundbreaking ceremony for American Steel & Aluminum's (ASA) planned expansion of its manufacturing facility in Saco. Prior to the ceremony, Senator Collins toured the existing facility, spoke with employees, and met with company leadership.

"ASA has long been a job-creating engine in southern Maine, and its investment in expanding its Saco facility is welcome news for the city and our state," said Senator Collins. "This project reflects the company's confidence in Maine's skilled workforce and will support good jobs, strengthen our manufacturing sector and defense industrial base, and contribute to continued economic growth in the region. I congratulate the entire ASA team on reaching this exciting milestone."

"This groundbreaking is for a 12,000-square-foot addition. It's going to bring many new jobs-about 30 new jobs are going to be on board here in the next couple of months. Our cutting capacity will double. [...] It's a commitment to the Maine workforce, the Maine industrial base, the maritime industrial base. Senator Collins, with your position on Appropriations in Washington-I go down once a year-I will say: You're one of the only ones that actually comes in and speaks to us. Usually, we're speaking to one of their underlings. So, we really appreciate that you take this so seriously and really understand the importance," said Sam Blatchford, CEO of ASA, at the event.

"Senator Collins, you've been supporting manufacturing and American Steel and Aluminum for the last 30 years. It's really made a big difference. We used to be a general line steel service center and really didn't differentiate ourselves from some of the competition. We've become an advanced manufacturing facility here. We're buying specialized equipment, we're adding value, we're contributing to national security. These are great jobs and this is just the start," said Scott Jones, president and CEO of ASA's parent company, Nova Steel, at the event.

ASA operates facilities in Saco, South Portland, Auburn, and West Bath and provides heavy-plate metal manufacturing and processing services to customers across a range of industries, including Maine's shipbuilding industry.

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