Steep Membership Decline Prompts WVIA To Sever Ties With Longtime Exec Bill Kelly

PITTSTON TOWNSHIP, PA — With membership down, Bill Kelly is out at WVIA.

But the longtime public broadcasting executive didn’t depart empty-handed, leaving the station he once headed with a nearly $300,000 buyout package, paid for by donations from board members.

“Not one penny of Kelly’s remaining contract payment of $291,878 came from membership contributions or grant support,” Martin Walzer, chairman of the WVIA Board of Directors, said in a message posted on the station’s website.

Kelly’s four-decade association with WVIA ended on Dec. 31.

Read more: http://www.timesleader.com/news/local-news/51009022/

Movement Underway In NEPA Counties, Cities To Form Land Banks

When General Motors shut down factories in Michigan, the city of Flint lost more than 70,000 auto industry jobs, resulting in an exodus of residents from the 1980s through today that left the city with half the population of its heyday.

The crisis created a cycle of abandonment and blight that prompted the region to create the Genesee County Land Bank, which spearheaded several major redevelopment projects in the city’s downtown, sold 4,683 tax-foreclosed properties from 2004-13 and demolished 3,400 buildings.

Some public officials in Northeastern Pennsylvania cities like Scranton and Hazleton have been thinking of forming their own land banks since Gov. Tom Corbett last year signed legislation enabling cities around the state to do so. Pittston and several neighboring Luzerne County municipalities recently created their own version.

“One issue we all face, that we really have a hard time fighting at the municipal level, is blight,” said Larry West, regional director for state Sen. John Blake, D-Archbald. “We have buildings sitting there on the tax repository list that are boarded up or have burned down.”

Read more: http://citizensvoice.com/news/movement-underway-in-nepa-counties-cities-to-form-land-banks-1.1806370

A Little Linguistics Fun From NEPA