Jim Becker and Angela Annibale talk the Economic Progress Alliance, along with the work they've done in the Crawford County area. Included in the discussion is their future work on the shores of French Creek, how they assist manufacturing in Crawford County, and their collaboration with the beehive at Conneaut Lake Park.
Sponsored By: Erie Regional Chamber & Growth Partnership
Music: Kevin Macleod’s "pamgaea" available via Creative Commons Attribution-International 4.0. License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
No changes were made.
Music by audionautix.com. Audionautix's "Roboskater" by Jason Shaw available via Creative Commons Attribution-International 4.0. License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. No changes were made.
Transcript
ANGELA ANNIBALE: Every year that we've taken over the park, the past five years, we've gone up a little bit. But this was, by far, our best season, this past summer.
TONY PEYRONEL: Excellent.
JIM BECKER: Every revenue source is up.
NARRATOR: That's Jim Becker and Angela Annibale, executive director and deputy executive director of the Economic Progress Alliance of Crawford County. They're the latest guest on Buzz, Generated, a show that introduces listeners to businesses and business leaders that collaborate with the Northwest Pennsylvania Innovation Beehive Network. The alliance, which focuses on promoting and enabling sustainable economic growth for Crawford County, crossed paths with the Beehive at local landmark Conneaut Lake Park.
Join Tony Peyronel, executive director of Edinboro University's Center for Branding and Strategic Communication as he sits down with our guest to explore this story, discovering what the buzz is all about.
TONY PEYRONEL: We're joined on the podcast today by Jim Becker and Angela Annibale, the executive director and deputy executive director of the economic progress alliance of Crawford County. Jim and Angela, it's a pleasure to have you on the program, and welcome.
JIM BECKER: Thank you, Tony.
ANGELA ANNIBALE: Thank you.
TONY PEYRONEL: As Crawford County's official industrial development agency, the Economic Progress Alliance is involved in many programs and manages multiple facilities. I thought we'd begin by having you provide our listeners with an overview of what you do to expand business development in Crawford County.
JIM BECKER: Well, we're an agency that is pretty diverse in the things that we get into. We own five separate properties. All of them have Brownfield ramifications, meaning they were environmentally damaged at some point, from either manufacturing activities early on in their building lives. And oftentimes we are the developer of last resort, if you will. Number one really wanted to take on the properties because of those additional environmental liabilities. So we stepped in as a developer, if you will, and assessed the environmental damage, remediated the environmental damage, in some cases entered into a consent order agreement with the Department of Environmental Protection, and then put those properties back into active reuse.
We have a facility in Linesville, Pennsylvania. We have a facility in Cochranton, Pennsylvania, we have a facility-- the old Avtech facility in Vernon Township. We have the Bessemer facilities in Meadville, sitting just on the city lines of Meadville, right along the French Creek. And we have Keystone Industrial Park, which is a 1,500-acre site located out in Geneva. It's a former ordnance works from the United States military back in the Second World War that we've been working to build infrastructure and prepare that site for future development.
TONY PEYRONEL: I know that the Keystone Regional Industrial Park, you've enjoyed very recent success. You have attracted an interesting tenant. And obviously here at our center — we're part of the Northwest Pennsylvania Innovation Beehive Network — we talk a lot, we emphasize innovation. And I noticed that your tenant, HydroBlox Technologies, turns recycled plastic into drainage blocks and boards, which seems pretty cool to me.
Can you start by telling us a little more about that company, and then maybe talk a little more about your future plans at that park.
JIM BECKER: Well, I'll let Angela start off with the company. She's intimately involved with the preparing, how we found that company, and an expansion mode to go into what was going to be a spec building and it turned into a selling facility.
ANGELA ANNIBALE: Yeah. We've been working with HydroBlox Technologies now for probably about the past eight months. They're a very cool company. Their product is made of 100% recycled plastic product. So they basically founded a solution for the plastic that's in the environment that nobody else wants. And they create a drainage product out of that that's really cool that can be used under roadways, or railroads, or athletic facilities, or tennis courts.
So we built a spec building. And as Jim mentioned, before the concrete was even poured, we sold it to them. They're a growing company. They've gotten all kinds of awards from recycling companies, department of environmental protection. So it was really exciting for us. And we were pretty happy about it.
TONY PEYRONEL: I bet. It sounds almost too good to be true, the whole process of taking something that's essentially waste and transforming it into an important industrial product. That element of it is kind of storybook, a little bit.
They're certainly a great company. But now that you've gotten them in there, are there other plans for that site?
JIM BECKER: Absolutely. There's been so many starts and stops out there over the years, for a variety of different reasons, usually none of them having to do with either the Economic Progress Alliance nor the individual company that was going to go in to the property. But literally nothing had been built out there in 17 years.
The Keystone Opportunity Zone Program, which is, in most cases, a real estate tax abatement program, was expiring in 2017. We went to the three taxing bodies and asked them to extend that for 10 more years, which is a big lift for all of the taxing bodies to agree to all those acres would continue to be off the tax rolls, and given us an opportunity to develop the property. We told them that if they did that, we as an organization, the Progress Alliance would go out and build a spec building. We would start the process. We would take the risk.
We went through the permitting, got everything done, built the building, and as Angela mentioned earlier, before we ever poured the concrete, Angela already had a business lined up to buy it-- not even to move in as a tenant, but to actually purchase a structure. They're going to hire 30 people over the next three years. They're already talking about expanding the existing 20,000 square foot building that we built. You couldn't ask for a better storyline.
TONY PEYRONEL: Right. That's super.
JIM BECKER: We've already started going through the process of subdividing additional lots right beside the building that we just built, four and five-acre lots. We're going to go ahead and build another spec building as soon as this one closes-- the official closing happens. We're going to build a whole other building right beside it, and try to do the whole thing all over again.
TONY PEYRONEL: Wow. Wow. That's a huge project. And I've heard you say in conversation previously that the alliance, in many ways, you try to focus on projects that will have a major impact, something very significant. But I think even by your own standard, the plans that you have for transforming the shores of French Creek into a heritage and entertainment area is off the charts. I mean, that's, like, crazy big. And I know you've already received a $2 million state grant to make that happen. So I'm wondering if you'll share some of the details of that project.
JIM BECKER: Well, there's been a group that's been in place for a couple of years now that quite frankly was developing this plan on how-- selfishly, how individual companies could attract and retain talent in the Meadville and Crawford County area. How the hospital could recruit a physician when they're competing against the likes of Seattle, what makes Meadville or Crawford County stand out. How can Allegheny College, in our neck of the woods, who has a campus in Meadville, recruit students who are also looking at Duke. How did them and their families make the decision to come to Meadville, Pennsylvania instead of North Carolina.
That conversation has been ongoing for, like I said, a number of years. And we've been able to coalesce all these separate ideas that have been out there and mingling, bring them all together, and start to create a plan on what our true asset was in the Meadville area, which is French Creek. It's a high-quality stream, if you will, that runs through the main corridor of the community. And most communities, like Meadville, were built with their backs to the waterfront. You can see it all over our region. If you look at Franklin, you look at Oil City, you look at Meadville, the bodies of water are typically to the backsides of the downtown communities.
We went out and talked to a number of legacy families, corporations, banks, and asked them, if this project moved forward, would they be interested in being part of it? And the typical answer was, yes, and how much? And our response in general was, thanks, and hold on a minute. Let's find out what we can get these other people to come in at, see what the commonwealth is going to do to support the project.
We've been fortunate enough to get, as you mentioned, a state designation. Angela is actually going to be leading the project from our office. And no better person to do it, because of her connections to the community, being a lifelong resident of Crawford County. But I'll let her touch on some of the amenities on how the project is going to move forward.
TONY PEYRONEL: Cool.
ANGELA ANNIBALE: Sure. Yeah, so the idea is to revitalize the entire French Creek corridor and connect it to the downtown. As you know, we have little shops, and restaurants, and all of those types of amenities downtown. And the idea is to form a loop between Allegheny College, and Naval Medical Center, and some of the shops and restaurants downtown, and connect it to the French Creek. And then the French Creek corridor itself would have walking trails and other things that would attract people there.
There's been the idea of a heritage and learning center to talk about why some of the manufacturers in the area are still there. Some of our legacy families, why they decide to stay in Meadville, what brought them to Meadville. Maybe a coffee shop where Allegheny can take prospective parents and students downtown. Maybe an environmental learning center type of thing, so students and people that are learning can get in the creek, and actually work in a Brownfield site.
Voodoo Brewery is right next door, right along the creek. So that would be really neat. Maybe an amphitheater for concerts and that type of thing. So just lots of exciting opportunity for downtown and that corridor.
TONY PEYRONEL: That's just so amazing. I just wonder if you even-- if you can put any kind of timeline on something like that. I mean, it's really-- it's just a huge scope.
JIM BECKER: This is going to be a long-term, multi-million dollar process. Fortunately and unfortunately, oftentimes, the newspaper headline reads we get $2 million, and some people think we've got a check yesterday. Unfortunately, we're still in the process of even doing the paperwork to finally talk about when that type of money could come. But we just got done writing a request, basically, for proposal for different types of design and engineering firms. That'll be going out as early as next week. So we can get someone to truly create what will be a master plan for the whole area.
ANGELA ANNIBALE: For phase one.
JIM BECKER: This was a $13 million project, $6 and 1/2 million request, that was pared down to a $4 million project and a $2 million award from the state. Now, we're incredibly grateful for forgetting that kind of money coming into Crawford County, because that historically has not happened. So we have some buy-in from the commonwealth and the governor's office in particular. And this will continue to get additional attention, and hopefully additional funds. But have to pare down what was the big project down to a smaller version of the project, with a phased approach of what we can do with the dollars and resources we have available. And hopefully high-impact projects get a whole bunch of Ws, get a whole bunch of wins early on, to be able to go back to the commonwealth and say, see, we told you. It was going to work. It's working. We got buy-in from the community, and here's what's next.
TONY PEYRONEL: Right.
NARRATOR: This episode of "Buzz, Generated" is sponsored by the Erie Regional Chamber and Growth Partnership, the voice of the business community in the Erie region. The chamber provides advocacy and access to people, education, and information so that businesses have the leadership resources and expertise needed for continued prosperity throughout the region. Schedule a time to meet with the Business Action Team, and learn more about how the chamber can help, or visit the Regional Chamber and Growth Partnership online at www.eriepa.com. The growth of our vibrant community and Erie, PA Depends on a dynamic business environment. The Erie Regional Chamber and Growth Partnership aims to provide just that.
TONY PEYRONEL: Well, there's so many amazing things you have to talk about. But I kind of chuckled to myself because you probably both anticipated that I wouldn't be able to get too far into this interview without bringing up Conneaut Lake Park.
JIM BECKER: (FACETIOUSLY) Where's that?
[ALL CHUCKLE]
TONY PEYRONEL: And l question for you is-- my first question for you on Conneaut Lake Park is, with all of the responsibilities of the Economic Progress Alliance, some of which you've just outlined for our listeners, with all of that on your plate, why do you think your management of Conneaut Lake Park gets so much attention?
JIM BECKER: The good attention or bad attention, which one?
TONY PEYRONEL: Oh, I'll let you pick.
ANGELA ANNIBALE: Yeah. Well, Conneaut Lake Park is obviously a very public amenity. It has a very long history. So people really enjoy coming to the park. People have very fond memories of going to Conneaut Lake Park. So it's just a very high-profile project for us. And we appreciate that. We have, I think, close to 30,000 followers right now on our Facebook page. And it's very high-profile, gets a lot of media attention. And we're appreciative of that, because it has a really great following of people who have supported it through the good times and the bad times.
JIM BECKER: There's been a long, storied history of how things were handled, sometimes not well, prior to our involvement in the project. And the Economic Progress Alliance stepped in as a managing entity on behalf of what is the trustees. It is truly a public trust. And for the past five years we've managed the project. My predecessor entered the Progress Alliance into this picture, and took the into the bankruptcy process. Since that has happened, we've paid back several million in back taxes. All of the taxing bodies have been paid in full and are current.
We've down to about $1.2 million in remaining secured creditor debt. We have a couple of different plans in place as an opportunity to get the trustees out of the bankruptcy filing in general. With all sources of revenue generated from this year, the 2019 season, it looks like we're going to be between $1.2 million $1.3 million for the season, which is pretty significant when you're talking Memorial Day to Labor Day and open four days a week.
So it's been a very good summer we're up about 13%, year over year, from '18 to '19. And it's-- some new amenities, like a marina, a small expansion at the Camper Land, the campground setting that we also manage. But it's been a--
ANGELA ANNIBALE: New lockers.
JIM BECKER: Believe it or not, new lockers, which is our number-one complaint about Conneaut Lake Park on our Facebook page. We entered into an agreement with a company that does it out of New Jersey. It was a profit-sharing deal. And it's turned into one of our biggest success stories for the summer, of all things.
But it's been that it's been a very good summer. The maintenance of the facilities and the rides have held up really well throughout the course of the summer. June was not good because of the weather. We had a lot of wet. But for the most part, the rest of the summer went really, really well.
TONY PEYRONEL: Great. Now, from my observation, you guys have put together a few very positive seasons. And I was wondering if you're to the point, even to compare this season to last in terms of your wristband sales and gift shop sales, I mean, it sounds to me you're coming off a very great season. Is that what I'm hearing?
ANGELA ANNIBALE: Yes. We're up from last season. And every year that we've taken over the park, the past five years, we've gone up a little bit. But this was by far our best season, this past summer.
TONY PEYRONEL: Excellent.
JIM BECKER: Every revenue source is up, everything, Camper Land, even. And we're maxed out on the amount of sites that we can do it Camper Land. That revenue is up, and I'm not even sure how. Our woman who handles the park at Camper Land, I'm not sure where she's sticking people to find additional revenue sources on off weekends. But I mean, we are 100% booked for, like, Pumpkin Fest. We are 100% booked for Memorial Day weekend next year.
ANGELA ANNIBALE: And there's a waiting list.
JIM BECKER: We have our waiting list of over 30 who are interested in full seasonal sites that we don't have any more sites for. The marina that we put in was sold out in three weeks. And people are paying us for next year already to lock in their slips, their boat slips.
Some of these things that we've been able to put in place have been very, very financially beneficial for the park, but also great additional amenities for people coming to the park.
ANGELA ANNIBALE: Including Connie Otter.
TONY PEYRONEL: That's right. Speaking of Connie Otter, of course Conneaut Lake Park is how we got to know each other. Because you did end up enlisting the services of the faculty and students in our Beehive to enhance your marketing communication efforts. But I have to say-- I'm going to direct this question to Angela, because you just gave me this sensation, the first couple times we got together to talk about this, you seemed a little skeptical. And so I have to ask you if the results of the collaboration did exceed your initial expectations.
ANGELA ANNIBALE: Absolutely. I think that I was a little skeptical about social media and increasing our social media presence, simply because we didn't quite have the staff to maintain it. But the Beehive has absolutely exceeded our expectations. The work that you guys did with Connie Otter, and rolling that out, that was fabulous. And we just don't have the capability in-house to do the graphic design stuff that you guys do. And we're very, very grateful for that. And we were really impressed with the work that the students did. It was really cool.
TONY PEYRONEL: Great. I can speak for the students and the faculty, too, that from our end, we thought it was an excellent experience, the graphic design component, them getting the opportunity. We were referring to Connie Otter, the somewhat vintage mascot of the park that they were able to refresh so that you could kind of reintroduce Connie this season. I think it was a very cool project from our end as well.
And I'm wondering as the obvious take-off to that, with all the businesses that you deal with, would you recommend the resources of the Innovation Beehive Network to other businesses that you deal with?
ANGELA ANNIBALE: Absolutely. I absolutely would.
JIM BECKER: Absolutely. It's been a real great collaboration. And quite frankly, it's helped us probably more than you realize. Because like Angela mentioned, we do not have the staff to do these types of, in many cases, nontraditional economic development activities. Running an amusement park-- I bet you can't find another economic development agency in the commonwealth who's running a vintage amusement park. And we've been able to, through these partnerships, put the extras in place.
We don't pretend to be the experts on amusement park operations. In many cases, we've slogged our way through it, made mistakes, and adjusted. But I think the results are now starting to speak for themselves. And more and more people are attending, and I think in part that's because of the enhancements on the marketing campaign that we did, some of these other pieces of the puzzle that we just recently did this summer, with geofencing and some of these other activities that your students and staff have helped us with as well, has been able to add that little bit of extra marketing and social-media-related activities. I think that truly has helped.
TONY PEYRONEL: Right. Well, that's good to hear. That's good to hear.
And I guess this question I want you both to answer, because I would suspect your approaches aren't identical. They might be a little different. But the alliance, your focus, you're about trying to bring business into Crawford County. And I'm just wondering-- you've alluded to this earlier, kind of with the French Creek project and the competition with other, perhaps, more glamorous places. I'm just wondering how each of you, what you include in your pitch that Northwest Pennsylvania is a great place to live and work.
JIM BECKER: Well, everybody likes singing the praises of quality of life. Every entity that's out there sings quality of life. What we've tried to do is remove barriers for employers to either invest or create jobs. We don't create jobs as an economic development entity. It's on others. If we put them on our staff, then we created a job. But those companies who have either barriers in place-- either financial barriers or facility barriers, they can't find facilities that fit their needs-- that's one of the reasons we own 2 million square feet of space. We have 50 tenants that we work with on a regular basis. Many of those companies had no other place to go. And by us taking on a Brownfield site and removing the barrier of what would have been multi-million dollar investments to make the facilities inhabitable, livable for a corporation to move into allows us to help do what we feel is our part, clearing the barriers to put the facilities in place for those companies to move into.
But truly, the quality-of-life piece, we think-- and I think-- Northwest PA is a great place to be. And to experience the four seasons, to experience the people that are here, the workforce that is here, I think it's a special place that not a lot of people have the opportunity to see until they actually come here and experience it.
TONY PEYRONEL: Angela, you grew up here, right, and you're still here.
ANGELA ANNIBALE: Yes. I moved away for a couple years, went to Washington, DC, and came back. So that tells you a little bit about how much I appreciate the area. And that goes from everything from the traffic-- the lack of traffic-- in Northwest Pennsylvania compared to a bigger city. And also I have a family now that I'm raising. And I just think it's a great place to raise a family. I think that the cost of living and all those things that go along with living in a small town make it just a great place to be.
JIM BECKER: And if you take a look at truly what we have around here, everything from arts and culture, to the educational opportunities, to the outdoor recreational activities, it's tough for any one place to match up what we have available here. And we have so many larger cities within an hour and a half of where we are. You have Buffalo, Cleveland, Pittsburgh. So you can get to those larger-city shows and things like that if you want to-- football games, basketball games-- but then you can go back home to the tranquility of your own house.
TONY PEYRONEL: Right. It's interesting you say that, and you included traffic in there. Because my son lives in the northern suburbs of Pittsburgh. And with I-79, you can almost get from our driveway in Crawford County to his driveway as quickly as you can get from the north side of Pittsburgh to the south side of Pittsburgh, going through the city. And there's really not very much of an exaggeration to that statement in terms of travel time.
ANGELA ANNIBALE: No. When I lived in DC, it took me 40 minutes to go seven miles.
JIM BECKER: When you start looking at the connectivity nowadays, not only for companies-- with high-speed internet access, with the transportation networks that are available, the relative closeness, as Angela mentioned, with three major markets around us-- it's no longer a barrier to be located in Northwestern Pennsylvania. It used to be years ago where it was truly a barrier, because you weren't around the companies that you needed to be around in the business sector.
That's no longer the case, with the hard connectivity some people want to continue to ramp up. And we should always look to upgrade and increase. But it is not nearly as bad as what people like to believe it is.
Now, you start getting out into some of the outer reaches, and Forest County, and some others, you have some issues. But along this main corridor, the I-79 corridor, we're actually pretty fortunate on how we are connected. And it's proven to be, now, a spot where companies can move to. They can locate here. They have the availability of workforce, and people with work ethic, which is a big deal. Companies are struggling to find people ready to work. There are hundreds of jobs available in Crawford County that can't be filled because you can't find people that are willing and ready to come to work. And that's because what we have going on right now. We're basically, in Crawford County-- you can always look at the unemployment numbers. But basically 100% of the people who want to work are working. And people are now starting to move here. Companies are now recruiting people from outside the area to move to Crawford County. And that's working. And we're bringing in new, fresh, skilled talent, which is always exciting.
TONY PEYRONEL: That's an interesting phenomenon. I think I'd like to begin to wrap up our conversation just by asking each of you if there is anything in particular that we haven't talked about that you'd like to share with our listeners.
JIM BECKER: Well I suppose our continued involvement with the Beehive, I think, is-- we definitely want to continue. And we're even talking about the possibility of including another-- discussions with a whole other university, which I think is very exciting. It's an opportunity to add another piece to the Beehive puzzle, we think. And I don't want to say diversify it a little bit, but add a different skill set or a different dimension that may not already be offered by the Beehive.
This collaboration of colleges and the network itself has been a-- it's a hidden treasure, I think, that manufacturers are now starting to figure out about. And the community is starting to figure out about the different opportunities that we can collaborate, and use the students, and the instructors, and the skills that are sitting out there. It's truly an opportunity to bring a whole other avenue for us to help promote either promote the community or identify different pieces within the community that we can use to help better the community. So I congratulate you on your foresight to get Edinboro into this. And I think it's been a very good opportunity for you and the students to be involved in this.
TONY PEYRONEL: Well, thank you very much for those kind comments about our program and about the relationship that we've developed. And Jim and Angela, thank you for coming and sharing your thoughts with us.
JIM BECKER: Thanks for having us.
ANGELA ANNIBALE: Thanks for having us.
NARRATOR: You've been listening to Buzz, Generated. This podcast was released through Edinboro University's center for Branding and Strategic Communication. It's produced by Keith Hepler, Britton Rozzelle, and Chris Lantinen.
Thank you to our guests for their insight, and to you, our listeners, for taking the time to experience innovation alongside us. Consider subscribing if you liked this episode to get more as soon as they drop. And if you really enjoyed it, jump over to Apple Podcasts for a five-star review. Thank you for listening.
