By james art STEVE INSKIPP, HOST:
On this election morning, we have a story about politics – not presidential politics, but everyday politics. While talking to constituents, we passed the US Steel plant in Braddock, Pennsylvania, and noticed a new restaurant across the street. Greg Neal was at the bar.
what are you drinking
He slid his finger down the menu to show me.
this is…
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: A cold martini.
GREG NEAL: Yes.
INSKEEP: Cold martini.
NEIL: Yeah.
INSKEEP: Okay, what’s the – is it gin, vodka? what is…
NEIL: Vodka…
INSKEEP: It looks like beer, to be honest.
NIEL: It’s great.
INSKEEP: Cold-brew is the coffee that gives the martini that look. Neal lives a few miles outside of this town, but he knows the history of Braddock, Pennsylvania.
NIELL: It was once a thriving community…
INSKEEP: Wow.
NIELL: …I mean, just boom.
INSKEEP: The steel plant once employed thousands, and Niell worked for US Steel as a welder. Now that the workforce has dwindled, much of Braddock is empty houses and vacant lots. Greg Neal adapted. Now he sells software to local businesses and the city is slowly adapting too…
NIELL: Things are going to start happening.
INSKEEP: …As this new business shows. The new bar is run by the same people who run a brewery down Braddock Avenue and who came to talk – Alaina Webber and Matt Katase.
MATT KATASE: We co-own the Braddock Public House.
INSKEEP: Katase grew up far away from here in Hawaii. He was drawn here to the Pittsburgh area by one of its great economic strengths — its universities. On campus, he began homebrewing and developed a business plan for a brewery.
KATASE: There was a mayor, a guy named John Fetterman, who came to campus and talked about, you know, Braddock and this urban border and sort of Braddock as this arts haven.
INSKEEP: He found a business partner, opened his brewery, and then found Alaina, who grew up in Pittsburgh.
ALAINA WEBBER: My father is an entrepreneur, he owned his own business. I am a first generation college student, so the first person in my family to go to school.
INSKEEP: Their new restaurant, of course, sells beer from the brewery, along with dishes that represent both owners — the Pittsburgh native and the Japanese American.
KATASE: Essentially the Pittsburgh classic with a Hawaiian-Japanese twist, because every culture has its own dough-wrapped item. Like pierogies in Pittsburgh. This is gyoza in Japan.
WEBER: So you get both here, side by side.
KATASE: You get both here.
WEBER: We have a really specific commitment to diversity as a company. A team is stronger when people are truly different.
INSKEEP: John Fetterman, the mayor who encouraged them, is now a U.S. senator. He also owns this building and lives upstairs. Braddock played a minor role in the presidential campaign. As we reported, both candidates oppose the plan to sell US Steel, including the plant across the street, to a Japanese firm. We found that many locals thought that a sale might be in order. And as a Japanese American, Matt Katase finds it all amusing.
KATASE: One of the biggest topics of this political session is a Japanese company buying…
INSKEEP: (Laughter).
KATASE: Just – it’s wild. i…
WEBER: You can’t make it up.
KATASE: You can’t make it up.
WEBER: That’s for sure.
KATASE: I – sometimes I…
WEBER: We didn’t plan that part.
KATASE: We’ve always said, depending on what happens, maybe we’ll have some nice Japanese whiskey here and get people together for a drink.
INSKEEP: Public House owners say they prefer not to announce how they vote. They have suppliers and distributors from across the political spectrum. But they say they are politically engaged because running a business requires it.
WEBER: Everything we do is based on international commodity pricing – grain, wheat, hops.
KATASE: Aluminum.
INSKEEP: Tariffs will affect you.
WEBER: Yes.
KATASE: Significantly.
WEBER: One hundred percent—significantly.
INSKEEP: They’re also affected by government regulations, like a change in Pennsylvania law that allows breweries to sell directly to consumers.
WEBER: I’m looking for politics, right? And that’s just not part of the conversation right now. It’s not what we hear in a lot of the media and the news is – what’s the policy? – because it affects us as business owners.
INSKEEP: Today’s election will decide who gets the next chance to make the rules. Braddock Public House is open Wednesday through Sunday, which means the five days after the election, whether you’re drinking in grief or celebration.
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