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I'm Katherine Cowdery Bloomberg. Taking Stock is brought to you by Sector Spider e t S. Why by a single stock when you can invest in the entire sector, Visit sector spdrs dot com or call one six six Sector at f The stock market is stumbling into the fourth quarter, weighed down by drugmakers and technology shares, lackluster growth, and manufacturing is doing little to boost optimism in the economy.
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one point six And that's a Bloomberg Business flash. You're listening to Taking Stock with Pim Box and Kathleen Mays on Bloomberg Radio. We are gearing up for our very special interview today with Loretta Mester. She is President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland. There's so much focus on FED Bank presidents, but you know, it's not just a president, It is a whole staff. It is many,
many people each of the regional Fed banks. And we're very happy to welcome now to the show to people who are part of the local community, the local region, the collegian Cleveland FEDS District UH to talk about what they do, what they do with the Cleveland Fed, and more broadly, what they see in the regional economy, because certainly this is one of the aspects of what Loretta Mester is watching as she helps formulate and guide policy.
Very happy. They welcome Todd Mason. He's president and CEO of the First National Bank of Pandora in nearbort Via, Pandora, Ohio. A community banker. He is on the Cleveland FED Board of Directors, uh Dave Meganheart, executive director at United Labor Agency right here in Cleveland, and on the Cleveland FEDS Advisory Council. Gentlemen, I welcome you both. Thank you. I'm sure you've been here many times. It's my first visit. So Todd start by telling us a little bit about
the First National Bank of Pandora. You know, your your business, community you serve, and how things look to you. First National Bank of Pandora is a small community bank in northwest Ohio. We're only a hundred and fifty million in assets, so we are a true community bank. We have agriculture, small businesses, and a lot of retail business. Okay, how is business right now? Actually, business is improving. If we take a look at what's going on in our community.
The house market is increasing, the prices are increasing, and a few take a look at our homes right now, if it's priced appropriately. Thirty days when will sell Okay? So, Dave Meginhart as executive director of the United Labor Agency, what does the United Labor Agency do? What do you do? Sure? UM, We're a labor based nonprofit based in Cleveland, and we
specialize in workforce development. And we like to tell people that we're the emergency room of the economy because we're often working with companies that are closing or experiencing layoff or companies that are hiring. So we're sort of had the whole cycle, the whole life and death cycle of any kind of business transaction. So what we do is we find uh workers or human capital for those companies. UM. And if they you're experiencing layoff, we try to find
your work for those workers. How how is the labor market doing here? Is specific clee in Cleveland. I think Ohio is a pretty diverse state, but in Cleveland, how do things look? UM? It has been It's really improved over the past couple of years. There's a lot of activity in the hospitality sector. There's a lot of manufacturing. There's an uptick with that. Transportation. Commercial transportation is always really big. UM. We have a lot of job orders
that are coming from UM. From companies UH, goods and services UH and healthcare. Of course, as Toby cross Grove said earlier, you know that's always a driver in Cleveland. UM. What the people that we work with are more of the lower skilled workers. There's a huge demand for that. I think as Ohio's population is aging, there's a lot of health healthcare, there's a lot of state UM UH nursing assistance, medical assistance that cand you know what we
look at that. We look at that for people that can get into a career and come up a career ladder. So it's a good first step for people. UM. Todd Mason, President and CEO, First National Bank of Pandora. How long have you been on the Cleveland FEDS board and what exactly ta listeners? What does a director do at a at a regional bank. I'm in my fifth year and we run for a three year increments on a term
and there's two term limits. And at first at the Cleveland FED we have two main things that we do. Number One, just like any other director, we oversee the operations of the bank. We look at UM strategic planning, budgeting and all those type of items just like any other director. On the other side. Our second main idea, Our second main topic that we talk about is what's
going out in our regional community. Each board member has a diverse background, different professional background, and we get that information because the FED is data driven and sometimes that data is a little bit slow to come. So all the directors, one of the things that we do is get that regional information, grab it, get it to our meetings and help Loretta with her monetary discussion. So do
you have any influence over policy? You give Loretta Master a snapshot of what you're seeing in your business in your community. Are you allowed some input and will you know? I think if you raise the key rate that be pretty good. I'm a community banker. I could use a little more net interest margin. We are all free to give our opinions on what is going on in our regional communities and how it is impacting us. Then Loretta
will make her decision on what she feels she should do. Okay, Well, similarly, Dave Megan Hurt, your executive actor, United Labor Agency. You're on the Cleveland Fence Advisory Council. So how does that work. I know there's been a lot of people and there's more and more focus on the fed around diversity. Do they pay enough attention to the community. Are they paying enough attention to the labor market when they consider raising
interest rates? Again? Sure? So the Business Advisory Council we meet twice a year, uh and it's a you know, it's made up of small businesses from it could be anything from UH tech startups to more of established manufacturing businesses and people like me, which are you know, we're from labor. Um. We work obviously with you know again with people that are experiencing displacement or looking for work.
We A'm very tight in with the local area unions. UM. You know, our job is to take all this information about what we see on the street and bring it to UH Loretta and also bring it to our staff. They listen to us, they want to they want to know that. I think it. I think it really helps
to hear what we're experiencing every day. UM. I think they have nine of these Business Advisory councils across the district in all the major cities throughout Ohio, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Kentucky, parts of all those states, all of Ohio and parts of the other states. UM. So, I think that if you think about all of that information, all of those different businesses and labor leaders and community leaders, and you know you can aggregate that. I think that
helps then bring it up into the president. Okay, well, uh something aside from monetary policy. The FED Reserve oversees lots of banks. At a regional bank, you are involved in exam examinations, all that kind of thing for a community banker though, Todd Dodd Frank. We have a lot of community makers on our show depending on what's in the news and what they're doing, and they say over and over it's Dodd Frank, is is put uh made
a very heavy compliance burden. It's raised costs. Community banks didn't cause the Great Recession or the Great Financial crisis. How is it affecting you? And is this something that the Fed and other people oversee banks need to be more mindful of shoreviews and changes made in Dodd Frank for example, a great point, Dodd Frank. The regulators that are writing the rules over ten thousand pages now and
it's not completed yet after seven years. I know in our small community bank, what we're seeing is we've had to go higher. A compliance officer, compliance consultant, yet a third party vendor to come check our double checkers, higher
software and do more things. Everything that Dodd Frank touches in our small bank, it's now more paper, more time cons atarter of fact, we're doing research right now taking our two thousand and seven income statement compared to two thousand fifty, trying to say what kind of impact does it have. It looked like God Frank is going to take a brown ten percent of our net income away when you compare that time frame. So as a community banker, UM,
we are not a fan of God Frank. Well, we know that the FED is itching two or some people. The FED it seemed to be itching to raise the key rate at least once more this year. Now, Ohio and this whole region in the several states that the Cleveland Fed encompasses a lot of manufacturing here, Starker dollar hurts manufacturing. Would you prefer not to see Dave Um the U FED make a move like this. If it makes the dollars Tragle will hurt you the workers here
in this area. I think it will. I think that Um we're on the rebound. I think it's been a long, hard slog from the Great Recession. I think there's uh. You know, for the first time in many years, the poverty rate has gone down in h in Cleveland, so we've seen traction. And I'd hate to have anything that could influence jobs and productivity and profit. Well, Todd Mason,
it may be inevitable. Whatever people want or don't want to see, uh, in terms of the region you serve, in terms of the bank, would an interest rate increase help you because of your profits or hurt you because it's going to slow down business. I think it's a little bigger than just profits. We have to take a look at our retired individuals that's in our community. They have had a very low rate of return for his long time, and with this low interest rate they're starting
to reach out and do investments. That's probably not as wise. And I'm telling you that in our community there anybody that wants a job has a job, and our houses are going up and the economy is improving. We really in our community bank point of view, see, there's no reason to keep rates at a at a stressed level. What a trade groundtable, gentlemen, thank you so very much for joining us. That was Todd Mason, he's president CEO of the First National Bank of Pandora and p Door, Ohio.
David Meganheart, Executive Director, Unitedly Agency in Cleveland. Davis on the Cleveland FEDS Advisory Council, Todds on the Border Directors coming up, Loretta Messer, President of the Cleveland FED. I'm Kathleen his and this is Bloomberg M