Wayne business park leans toward the future

By TOM KANE

STERLING TOWNSHIP, PA — With an eye to the future, a hearty group of business people, officials and business supporters gathered to celebrate the new sign at the Wayne Economic Development Corporation (WEDCO) business park.

“This gathering is more symbolic that anything else,” said WEDCO executive director Robert Suhosky. “We still have a lot of work to do and permits to secure before the first company breaks ground.”

The sign lists the institutions that have provided funding and financing for the park that is expected to be ready for customers by the middle of 2007.

The sign advertises 23 shovel-ready sites, located less than a mile from I-84.

The sign gives higher visibility to a notion that, up to now, has only been seen as a possibility, he said.

Recently, the group’s application for a permitted use to build the park in the township was opposed by a vote of two to one by the Sterling Township board and was reversed after a ruling by Judge Robert Conway of the Wayne County Court of Common Pleas.

“We’re definitely on our way now, ” Suhosky said. “We’re projecting that 1,200 new jobs will be created.”

The most important permits remaining deal with permission to construct a central sewer system, financed primarily by the state and to conform to the water-related regulations set by National Pollution Discharge Elimination System, a federal set of regulations concerning water resources.

Efforts to create the park began in July 2003 with the awarding of $40,000 from the federal Economic Development Agency (EDA) and $50,000 grants from Appalachian Regional Council (ARC) to fund feasibility studies. This effort was followed in 2004 by the purchase of 252 acres in Sterling Township, financed by a consortium of seven area financial institutions and Wayne County’s guarantee of $2 million.

This year, Pennsylvania Power and Light contributed $23,000 and the Commonwealth Financing Authority approved a total of $4.55 million.

In November, the federal EDA extended an invitation to WEDCO to submit a grant application for $950,000.

“I think the park will bring in the kinds of businesses that we want—clean industries and white- collar companies—that will provide higher paying jobs and not injure the environment,” said Mark Graziadio, Vice President of Honesdale National Bank. “I see it bringing in companies that will hopefully need local financing and help a business like ours to prosper, and for the entire business atmosphere to prosper.”

“As far as retail businesses like mine, companies in the park will give its employees the money to purchase our products,” said Tom Fasshauer, owner of Arts for Him, a men’s store on Main Street in Honesdale. “I see all businesses benefiting from the park.”

Businesses are ready to come, Suhosky said. “We’re getting inquiries already from companies. Because of our closeness to I-84 and because the Tobyhanna Army Depot, one of the largest electronic repair locations of the Department of Defense, is 20 minutes away, electronic companies will be attracted to our site.”