The City of Pottsville is planning to lease the entire second floor of Union Station Intermodal Transit Center in Pottsville to Schuylkill Economic Development Corp. and the Schuylkill Chamber of Commerce, Mayor John D.W. Reiley said at the conclusion of his State of the City speech Thursday night.
But first, the SEDCO board of directors must take formal action on the matter at its next meeting, slated for noon March 8, in Pottsville, according to SEDCO President Frank J. Zukas.
"Hopefully, our next meeting will be here," Zukas said, standing before the crowd of 80 assembled on the second floor of the station at 300 S. Centre St. for the mayor's addresses.
The Schuylkill Chamber's board of directors has already signed on, taking action at its Jan. 26 meeting at its current headquarters at 91 S. Progress Ave., said Chamber Executive Director Robert S. Carl Jr.
"We're honored by the fact that the city made this offer to us. We're coming into this business model with all sincerity. And we look forward to a bright future working together both here in the City of Pottsville and throughout the entire region," Carl said.
If all goes as planned, Zukas said, SEDCO will invest $300,000, embark on a renovation project and aim to open the new offices at Union Station sometime in June.
Carl said, "I'm not sure we can do it in four months but I hope he's right."
The city officially opened Union Station, a $16.1 million three-story building in a C-3 commercial zone on June 10. It was designed as the main terminal for Schuylkill Transportation System and home for the Schuylkill County Visitors Bureau. The building also houses a Pottsville police substation.
In November, the council agreed to allow QEI Construction, 14 Commerce Drive, Wyomissing, Berks County, to lease a space on the first floor.
Since day one, city officials have been working to find a tenant to occupy the 5,458-square-foot undeveloped space on the second floor, according to City Administrator Thomas A. Palamar.
At the conclusion of his 20-minute State of the City speech Thursday, Reiley read aloud the names of tentative tenants with a burst of confidence: "I am proud to announce that in addition to achieving the designation as the hub of transportation, this address will also be the hub of economic and business development in Schuylkill County."
Currently, the Schuylkill Chamber owns the building at 91 S. Progress Ave., which is a block north of Union Station. And SEDCO is one of its tenants.
In the plan that's being discussed, SEDCO would become the main tenant of the second floor of Union Station and the Schuylkill Chamber would be the subtenant, according to Carl and Zukas.
"SEDCO initiated the talks with the City of Pottsville. Plus they're going to be outfitting the space," Carl said.
Some of the engineering work has already been done by John E. Levkulic, Pottsville, principal of Levkulic Associates, who served as project consultant to the city for the Union Station project, according to Zukas.
The plan is to construct meeting rooms, a board room and at least eight offices, Zukas said.
"It will give us more capacity to hold our meetings in-house. It will also give us better technology to do better presentations," Zukas said.
"It will be up to speed with all new electronic connections," said Chester C. Corse Jr., the assistant city solicitor for economic development.
"We'll have SMART boards, projectors, the capacity to pull up geographic and geologic information on sites, much more than we can do now," Zukas said.
Zukas would not comment on what the monthly rent would be to the city.
"I'm not sure that's been decided yet," Corse said.
"SEDCO still needs to formulate the tenant agreement with the City of Pottsville. There are a few things outstanding," Carl said.
The Schuylkill Chamber currently has four full-time employees and 37 members on its board of directors and executive committee, according to Carl.
Meanwhile, SEDCO has three full-time employees, one part-time employee and a 60-member board of directors, according to Zukas.
"We think that it will give our agencies the ability to better represent all that is good about Schuylkill County, all that is positive with regards to staying here, locating here and growing here," Zukas said.
Regarding the State of the City, Reiley made a series of reports regarding work done by the city in 2011. They include the following:
- City street crews have applied 420 tons of paving material to streets and well-used alleys throughout the city. That's a 40 percent increase over how much material was used in 2010.
- City firefighters responded to 553 alarms in 2011, an increase of 21 from 2010. Fire loss increased by $400,255 in 2011, for a total of $1,178,305.
- Pottsville police had 15,374 dispatches, of which 9,819 were assigned incident numbers, completed 1,608 incident reports that resulted in 1,188 criminal investigations. Of those 921, or 78 percent, of those crimes were solved.