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INSIDE
Fortieth Edition
August 2005
Phone:
814.677.4800
Fax:
814.677.7663
P.O. Box 1127
395 Seneca Street
Oil City, PA 16301
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Thank you Governor Edward G. Rendell
for investing in NW PA!
July 22-23, 2005 was a great way to end the week for many
regional businesses and organizations as Pennsylvania
Governor Edward G. Rendell visited the region to award
millions of dollars in grants and loans in an effort to spur
job growth and retention.
July 22nd in Mercer County
The Governor visited Mercer County where he gave over $3
million to assist three projects that will create or retain
400 jobs. These projects include CCL Container Corp.,
Premier Hydraulics, Inc. and Identify Technologies all in
Hermitage.
Read the Governor’s press release on his visit to Mercer
County here at:
http://www.state.pa.us/papower/cwp/view.asp?A=11&Q=444517
July 22nd in Crawford County
More than $781,000 was given for projects that will create
and retain nearly 1,100 jobs in Crawford County. Projects to
benefit from the Governor’s aide are the Crawford County
Industrial Park East and the J-M Manufacturing plant.
Read the Governor’s press release on his visit to Crawford
County here at:
http://www.state.pa.us/papower/cwp/view.asp?A=11&Q=444524
July 23rd in Erie County
Checks totaling $7.13 million were presented for three Erie
County projects that will create and retain 781 jobs. The
three businesses the checks will assist are C.A. Curtze, E.D.
Smith USA Inc. and Erie Management Group (EMG).
Read the Governor’s press release on his visit to Erie
County here at:
http://www.state.pa.us/papower/cwp/view.asp?A=11&Q=444573
July 23rd in Venango County
More than $600,000 in funding was awarded to Franklin Bronze
& Alloy Co. to create 51 new jobs and retain 100 jobs in the
City of Franklin in Venango County.
Read the Governor’s press release on his visit to Venango
County here at:
http://www.state.pa.us/papower/cwp/view.asp?A=11&Q=444580
July
23rd in Clarion County
 Clarion
County was awarded over $2.3 million dollars in loans and
grants to assist in the creation and retention of 1,900
jobs, as well as support tourism promotion efforts in
Clarion County.
Projects that directly benefited from the Governor’s visit
were Trinity Point Industrial Park, Beaver Township
Industrial Park, the Enviro Biodiesel plant, Castle Housing
of Pennsylvania and the Heritage Trail Ecotour package
project.
Rendell also addressed the Knox & Kane Railroad, which would
serve the biodeisel plant and currently serves Clarion
Boards Inc. The railroad has raised concerns with the
business community as it is in need of costly repairs.
Rendell said Pennsylvania has 5,000 miles of railroad tracks
which cuts down on highway traffic and provides another
shipping option. He also mentioned he is certain something
is in the “pipeline” for restoration of the Knox & Kane
Railroad because his action team has spent time discussing
the issue.
Read the Governor’s press release on his visit to Clarion
County here at
http://www.state.pa.us/papower/cwp/view.asp?A=11&Q=444587
Read local article covering this event at
http://www2.theclarionnews.com/General_News/43263.shtml
For more information on Business in Our Sites and other
stimulus programs, visit
www.newPA.com
or call
1-866-GO-NEWPA (1-866-466-3972).
Deputy Secretary for Business Assistance, John Lori, visited
the Northwest Region and participated in a roundtable
discussion with local elected officials and economic
development partners. The Commission would like to thank
the Deputy Secretary for coming to the region and wish him
success in his new position |
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Point
of contact: Denise
McCloskey x123 |
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The
Appalachian Regional Commission awarded a $120,000 for the
Trinity Development Access Road Project in Clarion County.
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Point
of contact: Ned
Goucher
x108 |
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Staff met with several state and
legislative representatives in Harrisburg to discuss the
Commission's business attraction and marketing plan.
Several parties were excited with the potential of the
program, the business attraction website that has been
created, and the possibility of forming future
partnerships. Existing business attraction partnerships
include, but are not limited to, the 8 lead county economic
development corporations, First Energy, PPL, and DCED.
Future strategic partnerships will be critical to the
success of a regional business attraction program.
On August 5, 2005 the
Commission's Board of Directors began the process of
developing a
strategic marketing plan for business attraction efforts in
Northwest Pennsylvania by approving a resolution to retain a
marketing firm to work with Commission staff. The plan will
take several months to complete and will begin immediately.
A meeting with the firm has been set up for mid-August. |
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Point
of contact:
Denise McCloskey x123,
Lisa Hamrick x103,
or
Chris Beichner x101.
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Go to webpage |
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3 Loans
Approved in July |
• Shorts Tool & Mfg., Inc. of Crawford County
• Quality Tool & Die, Inc. of Crawford County
• Lakeland Diary Farms of Mercer County
Trainings dates for Microloan
clients: (go to our website for more information on these:
http://www.nwcommission.org/calendar.html
)
08/11/05 Negotiation – Start Winning! Stop Whining!
09/08/05 Getting your foot in the door to broaden
your base of business
09/14/05 Smart Women Finish Rich
09/21/05 Smart Couples Finish Rich
09/27/05 Getting your foot in the door to broaden
your base of business
09/28/05 Understanding Financial Statements
If you are a Microloan client and interested in attending
any of these trainings, please contact Ethel at (814)
677-4800 x113 or by email at
ethelr@nwcommission.org.
Northwest Commission will pay your registration fee. |
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Point
of contact: Daryl
Coyne x112 |
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Go to webpage |
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The NW PA PTAC would like to thank
the Ohio PTAC in Painesville, California University PA PTAC and
Southern Alleghenies PA PTAC for letting our PTAC staff visit and
gain new insight and ideas to bring back to the Northwest PA region.
Through many questions and sharing of ideas our PTAC has brought
back and put to use many of the ideas shared.
As we continue to move forward the
PTAC Team would like to thank everyone for their continued support
and understanding. We would also like to ask anyone who has
suggestions on how our program can better serve our area to please
feel free to contact either Aubri Minerd or Dianne McCartney.
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Point
of contact: Aubri
Minerd
x121,
Dianne Chelton
x106 |
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Go to webpage |
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Congress has
passed reauthorization of the transportation bill SAFETEA-LU at
a funding level of $286 billon. Pennsylvania should see a 19%
increase over the Funding in TEA 21. TE and Hometown
Streets/Safe Routes to School applications are due Sept. 30,
2005. The new formula for allocation of highway dollars is 30%
population , 30% lane miles, 30% VMT and 10% condition. |
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Point
of contact: Bob
Skarada x111 |
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Go to webpage |
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Commission staff is working to develop
fall classes for local government representatives throughout
Northwest PA. Please check back for more details.
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of contact:
Joe
Jarzab x124 |
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Go to webpage |
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A strategic technology plan is nearly
completed for a Venango County fiber optic and county-wide
wireless network. The consultant on the project, Community
Research Corporation, has been working very hard and closely
with several private telecom companies to turn this plan into
reality.
Senator Mary Jo White and the PA
Public Utility Commission is sponsoring two public hearings on
September 1st at Edinboro University. The topic of the hearing is
the potential merger of Verizon and MCI. Anyone interested
in testifying at this hearing should contact Dom DeMarinis of
Senator White's office at 814.432.4345.
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of contact:
Chris Beichner
x101
or Joe
Jarzab x124 |
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LTAP surveys were sent out in early July to
the municipalities in our five-county Rural Planning
Organization (RPO) and to the municipalities in the Erie
and Mercer Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO). The
surveys were to see what transportation related courses
that they are interested in. Once the surveys are
reviewed, classes will be scheduled to take place in the
region later this fall. These classes are FREE for local
municipal officials to attend. |
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of contact:
Matt
Gilara x102 |
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Currently there are no new
PennSTEP projects in the works. Harborcreek Township (Erie
County) was in contact with the Northwest Commission a
while back and is still interested in using PennSTEP
assistance. The Amish wastewater project in Crawford and
Venango Counties are in the data collection stage and
should be wrapping up soon.
If there are any communities in the region that are
planning a wastewater or drinking water project (new
installation and/or extension) please contact the
Northwest Commission to see if PennSTEP can help. |
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of contact:
Matt
Gilara x102 |
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Go to webpage |
Export Compliance Workshop:
Sept. 1, 2005
This one-day seminar, presented by the international trade
compliance training company, Unz & Co., is essential for
every U.S. exporter and manufacturer who wants to ensure
compliance for their export products under the Export
Administration Regulations (EAR). Each participant will
obtain the tools to fully comply with the EAR, learn about
product license determination procedures and how to
determine schedule B and ECCN numbers.
The seminar is scheduled
for Sept. 1, 2005, location Radisson Hotel, West Middlesex
(Sharon). Cost to register $ 75.00. For additional
information, please contact Dorte Heffernan.
Trade Mission to India, October 23-29, 2005.
Click here for the
brochure/registration.
Trade Mission to India
October 23-29, 2005: Deadline August 5th!
With the second largest consumer population in the world,
a well developed banking system, and English widely
spoken, the Indian market has many great possibilities for
interested companies. The goal of this trade mission is to
match Pennsylvania companies with the appropriate
in-country contacts and potential business partners. While
visiting Mumbai, Delhi, and Bangalore, Pennsylvania's
Representative Office will arrange for a full schedule of
business appointments with pre-screened potential
partners.
The registration fee is $
600.00, airfare, hotel costs and other expenses are the
responsibility of each participant. Deadline to register
is August 11, 2005. For additional information please
contact Robin Fisher at the Office of Inter
national
Business Development at (717) 720 7363. |
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Point
of contact: Dorte Heffernan
x110
or
Claudia Garcia |
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Go to webpage |
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The
Northwest Commission recently hosted a two-day
Introduction to ArcView 9.1 class. Thirteen (12) GIS or
potential GIS users from the region and one (1) GIS user
from outside the region attended the class. There is an
Advanced three-day GIS class scheduled for September 7-9.
There are currently eleven (11) GIS users signed up. There
will be a Northwest Pennsylvania GIS User Group meeting on
August 26, 2005 at the FICDA facility in Franklin. The
agenda for the GIS User Group meeting will be posted on
our website in the near future. |
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Point
of contact: Matt Gilara
x102
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The Northwest Commission received a $53,350 First Industries
Fund planning grant for the planning and predevelopment of
the Heritage Trail Ecotour Package Project. The project will
provide multi-day heritage trail tours, an outdoor
theatrical performance, interactive museums, villages and
more. The concept of
the Heritage Trail Ecotour Package Project is to provide
the best of multi-day heritage trail tours, which
culminate with a theatrical ecotour performance in a
rustic theater setting. The plays will be custom
designed and specific to the heritage of the trail.
The project are will include the counties of Clarion,
Forest, and Warren. The City of Titusville, which is
located in Crawford County, will also be included.
Major tourism attractions include the Allegheny and
Clarion River corridors, Kinzua Reservoir, the Allegheny
National Forest, Tionesta Reservoir, Cook Forest, and
Drake Well. This
project will merge the area's tourism assets into a logical
marketing package capable of attracting significant numbers
of tourists into the region. As the list of major
attractions indicates, there are a number of tourism assets,
which could be packaged as a collection of attractions that
are worthy of more than a single days visit.
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