WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 30, 2016
CHESTER COUNTY PRESS
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Chester County Press
Local News Parking garage... Uncle Irvin...
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barracks of the Pennsylvania State Police is a serious mistake, mired in bad judgments from the Board of Supervisors, starting with Tom Houghton and continuing with current supervisor David Connors. Buying the Inniscrone Golf Course and liquor license and hocking the township with $1.3 million of bank loans is a serious oncoming calamity that’s similar to the Oxford Area Sewer Authority’s passing a huge loan into the lap of its residents. Instead of investing in the safety of residents, London Grove supervisors are staying with an investment in a golf course that is losing money every year. The course and liquor license should be put up for sale to a private operator who can build a dining facility/banquet hall in the Hartefeld model that can make money and get London Grove out of the business. (Uncle Irvin’s column is his opinion only, and is not a news story.)
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residents of Harrogate North, leaders of other communities impacted by the flies, and experts from Penn State and American Mushroom Institute’s (AMI) Integrated Pest Management Committee. Dinniman has led the effort to address the infestation of tiny insects that have plagued dozens of homeowners and residents in New Garden Township and nearby areas. Earlier this month, he held a town hall meeting with local residents and mushroom farmers and composters to discuss and coordinate ongoing efforts to address the problem. “This is an issue that negatively impacts both the quality of life of local residents and the crop yields of neighboring mushroom farmers,” he said. “There has got to be a way we can
work together to eliminate this fly for the betterment of the entire community.” In addition, the Department of Agriculture also approved $77,000 in research grant funding for the AMI to study the beneficial uses of mushroom compost. These two grants were part of nine projects statewide approved for more than $600,000 in total funding to improve the Pennsylvania agricultural industry’s understanding of pressing challenges and promising opportunities. Proposals were evaluated and scored on a number of factors, including the strength of its needs statement, the potential impact of outcomes, methodology, evaluation and replicability, and industry support and participation. In addition, the American Mushroom Institute will receive $50,000 in federal funding to bring
the Mushroom Good Agricultural Practices (MGAP) program into compliance with the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) Produce Rule and standard benchmarked under the Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI) recognized auditing programs. That grant funding comes through the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Specialty Crop Block Grant Program, authorized under the 2014 Farm Bill. Grant recipients are selected by the Pennsylvania Specialty Crop Advisory Board, approved by the Pennsylvania Secretary of Agriculture, and then approved by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Marketing Service. To contact Staff Writer Richard L. Gaw, e-mail rgaw@chestercounty.com.
state, and county funding throughout this year. Garcia-Allen explained that the borough initially applied for approximately $1 million in funding through the county grant program in April, one of numerous grant applications that the borough has submitted so far. Chester County officials awarded a total of about $2.3 million in funding for economic development projects throughout the county with this round of grants, she said. “This is the highest award that they gave this year,” Garcia-Allen said. “It’s an indication that this is a strong project.” The parking garage study recommended a 300-space parking garage that would be constructed on a parking lot near the center of the business district. Business leaders in Oxford have championed the parking garage as an economic driver that would boost economic development in town. A parking garage would offer a longterm solution to the parking issues that have hindered Oxford’s efforts at attracting new businesses,
especially a larger one that would serve as an anchor to the rest of the business district. During the past 12 months, the scope of the parking garage project has evolved. The structure is now proposed to function as a transit center that could potentially link Oxford to some other form of public transportation in the region. This could make the project eligible for additional funding from federal, state, and county sources. Oxford officials have been working with Krug and Garcia-Allen on the parking garage project in a variety of ways throughout the year. They negotiated an agreement with National Penn Bank (which is now BB & T Bank) to purchase the two parcels that comprise the parking lot if plans to build the parking garage on the site come to fruition. Oxford Borough officials are having ongoing negotiations with Verizon to discuss the small piece of the property that the company owns on the parking lot where the parking garage is expected to be built. Garcia-Allen said that State Rep. John Lawrence has helped with facilitating the discussions between Oxford Borough and Verizon. Lawrence has
also assisted borough officials as they seek funding for the parking garage at the state level. Borough manager Brian Hoover, borough council president Ron Hershey, and Oxford Mainstreet, Inc. executive director Donna Hosler led a contingent that traveled to Harrisburg on Nov. 21 to meet with officials at the state level to discuss Oxford’s application for funding from the state. There were three meetings that took place throughout the day, and Oxford officials were very optimistic. Garcia-Allen noted that, with the state budget delay in 2015, funding for many economic development projects throughout Pennsylvania were delayed, and the backlog of those projects is only now starting to be cleared. According to GarciaAllen, now that Oxford has one grant in hand from Chester County, that funding can be utilized as a match for grants from the state and federal level. Securing a revitalization grant from the county is a very good start to a process that will continue well into 2017. To contact Staff Writer Steven Hoffman, email editor@chestercounty.com.