Coal Mine Closing To Slash 500 Jobs In Greene County

Map of Pennsylvania highlighting Greene County (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

WAYNESBURG, PA — Among the rolling hills and in the small towns of rural Greene County, where coal long has been king, the news brought shock waves.

Emerald Mine near Waynesburg is closing.

Coal producer Alpha Natural Resources said Wednesday that about 500 workers will lose their jobs. A spokesman cited diminishing reserves, sluggish markets and restrictive federal Environmental Protection Agency regulations.

At least one businessman in the borough some 50 miles south of Pittsburgh believes he knows where to place the blame.

Read more: http://powersource.post-gazette.com/powersource/companies-powersource/2014/08/07/Actions-of-inexperienced-greenhat-led-to-fatal-well-explosion-DEP-says/stories/201408070178

Summer Workers Help Fight Mon Valley Neighborhood Blight

Map of Pennsylvania highlighting Allegheny County (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Mon Valley communities are reliant on the helping hands of summer workers as they battle blight through maintenance projects.

In third class cities such as McKeesport and Clairton — once-thriving mill towns that decreased in population and economic activity with the decline of the steel industry in the 1970s and ’80s — cityscapes have changed over the years.

Many neighborhoods that were lined with well-kept homes transformed into urban decay where residential properties are separated by overgrown lots and dilapidated structures. With an increase in problem lots and a decrease in staff to maintain them, the cities rely on young workers eager to gain job experience during their time off from high school and college.

“Our public works department is bare bones,” Clairton Mayor Rich Lattanzi said. “They prioritize on snow removal, grass-cutting of city-owned properties and potholes throughout the year. Summer help gives an opportunity for some of our youth to make a few dollars and supplement what public works is doing.”

Read more: http://triblive.com/neighborhoods/yourmckeesport/yourmckeesportmore/6537806-74/summer-workers-public#ixzz399pCVoJu
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Verizon Wireless To Close Marshall, Cranberry Call Centers, Cut 1,000 Jobs

Map of Butler County, Pennsylvania with Municipal Labels showing Cities and Boroughs (red), Townships (white), and Census-designated places (blue). (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Verizon Wireless will slice more than 1,000 jobs in Western Pennsylvania when it closes customer call centers in Cranberry and Marshall in May, the company said on Wednesday.

“This was a very difficult but necessary business decision,” Verizon Wireless spokeswoman Laura Merritt said in a statement.

The Cranberry call center employs about 600 customer service workers in the Cranberry Woods business park. The one in neighboring Marshall will lose about 430 workers, including 200 in telemarketing and 230 in business and government support.

A Verizon regional headquarters for Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia will remain in Marshall, preserving 340 jobs.

Read more: http://triblive.com/business/headlines/5584718-74/verizon-wireless-call#ixzz2tEyTkh5g
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Foreclosure Activity Surges Across Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Region

Locator map of the Scranton-Wilkes-Barre Metropolitan Statistical Area in the northeastern part of the of . (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Regional foreclosures advanced at the state’s highest percentage among metropolitan areas in 2013.

Property repossessions, home auction notices and mortgage default activity in the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre metro area soared by 60 percent, compared to 2012, according RealtyTrac, a Los Angeles-area company that tracks national foreclosure trends.

Foreclosures climbed in the area during all four quarters of the year and the annual increase was largest proportionately among state metro areas, RealtyTrac data show. York’s 32 percent increase was the second-largest jump.

The region experienced eight straight quarters of foreclosure declines before activity accelerated in the first quarter of 2013.

Read more: http://citizensvoice.com/news/business/foreclosure-activity-surges-across-region-1.1619761

Teva To Cut 5,000 Jobs As Drug Company Winds Down Bucks Operations

Map of Bucks County, Pennsylvania, United States with township and municipal boundaries (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Teva Pharmaceutical Industries will cut about 5,000 jobs, 10 percent of its workforce, accelerating a cost-cutting plan as it prepares for lower-priced competition for its best-selling drug.

Teva, the world’s largest maker of generic drugs, said it expects to save about $2 billion a year by the end of 2017.

In May, the company announced plans to close its West Rockhill Township manufacturing plant in 2017, eliminating more than 450 jobs there and dealing a significant blow to northern Bucks County‘s employment base.

Teva is the Pennridge-area’s second-largest employer after Grand View Hospital.

Read more: http://www.mcall.com/news/breaking/mc-teva-fires-5000-workers-20131010,0,7070943.story#ixzz2hKpgdvPX
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30 Years Of Change: A New Direction For Pittsburgh

English: Downtown Pittsburgh (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Morphing from steel industry collapse to eds-and-meds rebirth, from a too-gray place that young people flee to one that attracts them as a “green” center of culture and recreation, from a tale of Rust Belt woe to one of urban transformation, it is indisputable that the Pittsburgh region is a far different place than it was 30 years ago.

And by most standards, it would seem to be a far better place as well.

Since 1983, when the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette published a special section chronicling the unique and worrisome issues confronting the region during Depression-level hits to its workforce, Pittsburgh has lost people, corporations, churches, schools and, yes, even a prothonotary.

But it has rebuilt its economy; added museums, theaters and riverfront trails; replaced its sports facilities, airport and convention center; and reinvented the Pittsburgh Downtown as a place to live, while serving the thousands more who commute to it by opening a subway, busways and a highway to the north.

Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/local/region/30-years-of-change-a-new-direction-for-pittsburgh-706424/#ixzz2gzxczfUQ

Walgreens To Close Lehigh Valley Distribution Center, Lay Off 400

Map of Pennsylvania highlighting Northampton County (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Walgreens will close its distribution center in Hanover Township, Northampton County, marking one of the largest layoffs in the Lehigh Valley in recent years.

The facility’s 400 employees will be laid off in phases, beginning in mid-January and concluding in March. Employees at the center, at 125 Commerce Way in Lehigh Valley Industrial Park IV, were informed of the decision Thursday.

“Our Lehigh Valley Distribution Center has served the company since 1991, making the decision to close it a difficult one,” Emily Hartwig of Walgreens corporate media relations said Friday.

Hartwig said the layoffs are part of the drugstore chain’s effort to maximize efficiencies at its distribution centers across the region.

Read more: http://www.mcall.com/news/breaking/mc-walgreens-to-close-bethlehem-distribution-cente-20130927,0,1515055.story#ixzz2gCXpUaeT
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Reading Area Mail Slowed By Post Office Moves

USPS service delivery truck in a residential area of San Francisco, California (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Mail delivery has been slowed in the Reading area due to the recent termination of mail processing in the city, but a U.S. Postal Service spokesman said Wednesday that the delays should be temporary.

The mail that used to be processed at the Gus Yatron Postal Facility, 2100 N. 13th St., is now being handled in a Harrisburg facility.

The change was part of the Postal Service’s nationwide cost-cutting efforts, which include the closure of hundreds of mail processing sites.

The Postal Service no longer has the mail volume to justify keeping those facilities open, officials have said.

Read more:  http://readingeagle.com/article.aspx?id=485891

Federal Budget Cuts Will Affect More Than Federal Programs, Officials In Scranton Say

English: Official photo of Senator Bob Casey (D-PA). (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The across-the-board federal budget cuts known as sequestration will hurt everything from the local barbershop to the largest manufacturers in Northeast Pennsylvania, said members of a panel at Sen. Bob Casey’s office Friday in downtown Scranton.

With no deal between Congress and the White House in sight and just hours before sequestration kicked in at midnight, the Democratic senator and a cross-section of local civic leaders struck a dire tone.

“We don’t have a full sense of what will happen,” Mr. Casey said.  “If this goes a day or week, it will have an impact.  If it goes six months, the effect will be devastating.”

As the furloughs and cuts begin, sequestration will have an immediate impact not just on the government employees, but on contractors, and the communities where they live and spend.

Read more:  http://thetimes-tribune.com/news/federal-budget-cuts-will-affect-more-than-federal-programs-officials-in-scranton-say-1.1452684

The Pride Of Clairton: A Town Looks To Football Team For Hope Amid Its Struggles

Map of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, United States with township and municipal boundaries (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The doors to the Clairton Bears’ locker room are closed.  A space usually pumped full of booming bass from hip-hop music is silent, except for the young man in the corner wearing a black No. 9 jersey.  Sitting on a bench, he bows his head and cries.

His name is Robert Boatright.  He’s a senior running back and defensive end.  Senior Night festivities are complete, and Boatright still doesn’t know if he’ll play college football.  Now he’s gulping back tears.

Terrish Webb is Boatright’s best friend.  He moves to Boatright and consoles him.  Webb knows where he’ll play next year, at Kent State.  Even with his clarity on a night full of questions, Webb begins to cry, too.  His father was murdered when Terrish was 11, and it hurt hearing his dad’s name announced on Senior Night.

The rest of the seniors join Webb in forming a circle around Boatright, wrapping their arms around each other.  Nobody else can enter.  They’re the protectors of a historic winning streak that weighs on them daily. It’s at 55 now, will be 56 in a few hours, one more box checked until Heinz Field on Nov. 23, when they’ll likely set a state record of 60.  If they lose before then — or any other time, really — they believe they’ll be seen as failures.

Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/local/neighborhoods-south/clairton-looks-to-team-for-hope-amid-struggles-663011/#ixzz2D4FiVth5

Neapco Moving Headquarters To Michigan – Today’s Mercury Coverage

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According to a write up in today’s Pottstown Mercury, Neapco is now moving their corporate headquarters to Michigan.  A Neapco VP says this will have a minimal impact on what’s left here in Pottstown.  Still very sad.

Then, as one reads along, a bomb is dropped.  The article is talking about how manufacturing was consolidated in Beatrice, Nebraska and how the state of Nebraska gave Neapco a $1 million dollar loan.  The expansion of production facilities in Nebraska created 70 jobs. (how nice for Nebraska)

The next paragraph made me absolutely sick.  The same VP, Keith Sanford, goes on to say “no financial incentives to consolidate the company’s manufacturing in Pottstown were offered by any organization in Montgomery County or the borough.”  90 jobs were eliminated in Pottstown as a direct result.  Nebraska offered Neapco financial incentives to move our jobs out of Pottstown!

Well isn’t that just special!  If somebody would have called Harrisburg there is money for these types of things.  Ed Rendell, when not busy yelling at Leslie Stahl, has gotten involved with numerous other communities to keep jobs in PA! 

Considering that jobs are hard to come by in Pottstown, other than fast food and retail, we should have at least tried to offer them something.  It sounds like they might have been receptive.

We have a Keystone Opportunity Zone (KOZ) in this town with one business in it (that I am aware of).  I bet Harrisburg would have come up with money to expand on Queen Street OR build Neapco a new modern facility in our KOZ, which offers tax incentives to businesses!  

We could have kept our 90 jobs and added more jobs.  Instead, Nebraska added 70 more jobs and we lost 90!

Keystone Opportunity Zones are such a breakthrough idea that Business Facilities magazine calls them “the number one economic development strategy in the nation.” By eliminating specific state and local taxes within specific underdeveloped and underutilized areas, communities within Pennsylvania are experiencing economic growth and investment.  

Here is a link to the website where the above quote is from:

http://www.newpa.com/build-your-business/locate/keystone-opportunity-zones