I was asked to speak about the role of the Appalachian Regional Commission in developing an industrial park project. I am the director of a small, private non-profit development firm serving Jefferson County, Ohio.
In Jefferson County, in 1997, officials of one of our existing distribution-related businesses came to us seeking sites for a more than doubling of its existing warehouse space. It employed over 100 people here. When the CEO came to see what we were calling our Industrial Park, all we could show him was an open field. The water and sewer was not there. The only road was a narrow county road not ready for heavy trucks. We had just secured funding commitments for installing public improvements, but we were still months short of starting construction. Our industrial park was "unfinished."
If he was to build his large warehouse there, he had to take our word on it.
He didn't. It's understandable. Not too many businesses can be expected to make multimillion dollar decisions based on an economic development guy's sales pitch or the county commissioners' promise to bring water and sewer to its site. Instead, the firm moved to a competing industrial site in Weirton, West Virginia where two years earlier funding helped to get that counties' open field "finished" and truly prepared for development. It was ARC funding that got that West Virginia Industrial Park ready to go.
Testimony of Richard J. Platt - August 8, 2000
This story isn't sour grapes though. It's a story that illustrates the difference between a community where the ARC funding was involved and one where it wasn't.
Today, with ARC, funding which helped to leverage other federal and state funding, we have an industrial park of our own--93 acres with water, sewer, three-phase power, and widened roads. The park is 1.5 miles off of four-lane US Route 22 with no stop lights for the 35 miles east to Pittsburgh International Airport. Our park's infrastructure was completed late last year, a spec building completed this Spring, and a flex space building expected to start construction next year. We hope to accept our first permanent tenant soon.
ARC's $300,000 grant for public infrastructure improvements was matched by Economic Development Administration (EDA) funding ($926,000), state of Ohio grant money ($500,000) and local funding too ($500,000). That 12% funding was the difference between a Park that was unfinished and one that was finished--truly ready to go. We are now equipped to retain our existing businesses while seeking to attract businesses that want to access markets from our location.
Additionally, the Ohio Mid-Eastern Governments Association, the local development district that supports Jefferson County and others in Eastern Ohio, was a useful provider of grant support and advice. The Governor's Office of Appalachia was there to help pull it together too. Now that it's complete, ARC funding is helping us market the Park too.
The completion of the Park, though, does not mean we are finished. And I think our story in Eastern Ohio is true in many other parts of Appalachia too. We have more important work to get done.
Thanks in part to ARC, there are now industrial parks dotting most of Eastern Ohio's counties between Columbus and Pittsburgh. When you widen the view from our one county to a
Testimony of Richard J. Platt - August 8, 2000 twelve-county corridor between Pittsburgh and Columbus, you see though, that the dots aren't connected.
There are five key projects that need to be completed. Please see the exhibit map.
The highways that link Pittsburgh and Columbus, chiefly US Routes 22 and 36, need to be connected. One project is just 12 miles between Coshocton and Dresden and the other is 28 miles connecting US36 and US22 between Newcomerstown and Cadiz. These two projects would connect many of the ARC-funded industrial parks to a viable corridor.
Other modes of transportation remain critical as well. The Ohio-owned Panhandle railroad line which once ran between Pittsburgh and Columbus is doing well again. It needs to be "finished," though, by reconnecting Cambridge and points South to the line at Newcomerstown. We need to assist in refurbishing the best connection the Panhandle makes to the Ohio River where the Warrenton River Terminal provides a way to get Ohio-made goods on to the River and to global ports of entry.
Five key projects--16 miles at Coshocton, 28 miles at Newcomerstown, 20 miles of railroad at Cambridge, 15 miles of railroad at Rayland, and an upgraded Warrenton River Terminal--are central to finishing some of the unfinished business of Appalachian Ohio.
Of the twelve counties on this three-state, Pittsburgh-Columbus Corridor, ten are Appalachian counties. Connecting the dots in Appalachia. That's what its about. And its no different in Appalachia than elsewhere.
In Columbus, the $127 million Franklinton Floodwall has been a mostly federally-funded project. It gets federal funding on the premise that it will help economic development for the residents of a part of Columbus. The projects I've mentioned benefit economic development for a whole region. Testimony of Richard J. Platt - August 8, 2000
In Cleveland, they want $4 billion in mostly federal funds to finish their airport and gain access to International flights. We need considerably less than that to connect Eastern Ohio with daily direct flights to London, Frankfurt, and Paris out of Pittsburgh International Airport. The projects I've mentioned will do that.
We don't begrudge Columbus or Cleveland or cities where federal funds have helped to make them more competitive. In Appalachia, funding flows a different way. That's all. We get it through ARC. ARC's work is not done because their remains unfinished business in Appalachian Ohio.
Thank you.