October 06, 2021 |
By Submitted Report | Posted in: McKeesport and Region News
Policing and the community will be the focus of this year’s Crossing Bridges summit at Penn State Greater Allegheny in McKeesport.
The sessions will build off of issues raised in a report delivered by the Community Taskforce for Police Reform, which was convened in 2020 by Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto.
The first session, scheduled for 3 p.m. Oct. 14, will be titled “Examining Police Reform: Conversations about the Pittsburgh Community Taskforce for Police Reform and Its Implications for the Mon Valley.”
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October 05, 2021 |
By Jason Togyer | Posted in: McKeesport and Region News
Trulieve Cannabis Corp., which acquired McKeesport-based PurePenn in 2020, is purchasing three buildings and approximately 37 acres of property in the city’s industrial park, RIDC announced Tuesday. (Tube City Almanac photo)
A medical-marijuana producer has committed $10.4 million toward expanding its operations in the city’s industrial park, with the possibility of adding 800 jobs.
Trulieve Cannabis Corp., which purchased McKeesport-based PurePenn in 2020, is acquiring approximately 37 acres of property and three buildings, Regional Industrial Development Corp. announced Tuesday.
The purchase includes McKeesport Commons I — the former EchoStar call center — and McKeesport Commons II, a vacant building next door. Trulieve also is acquiring the guard shack located at the Locust Street railroad crossing, RIDC said.
Discussions about selling the two McKeesport Commons buildings have been ongoing “ever since the acquisition of PurePenn by Trulieve,” said Timothy White, senior vice president for development at RIDC. “They’ve obviously had some aggressive expansion plans and they’ve been looking at McKeesport as a place to expand and grow.”
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October 04, 2021 |
By Vickie Babyak | Posted in: McKeesport and Region News
Tristian Banks and Calise Johnson, two of the YouthCast photographers, stand in front of the mural unveiled on Saturday. (Vickie Babyak photo for Tube City Almanac)
A new mural decorating McKeesport City Hall features the faces of ordinary residents, as captured by youth photographers.
The mural, unveiled at 12 noon Saturday, is a collage of photos captured over the past two years by teen-agers from McKeesport’s YouthCAST program with guidance from Martha Rial, a Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer who oversees Point Park University’s McKeesport Community Newsroom.
YouthCAST members have been talking with residents, giving elderly people roses and learning about photography as they made portraits of McKeesport residents from different backgrounds and of different ages.
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October 02, 2021 |
By Jason Togyer | Posted in: McKeesport and Region News
A two-alarm fire that gutted a house in the 1300 block of Locust Street on Thursday night is under investigation by McKeesport police and the Allegheny County fire marshal’s office.
The two-story wood-frame home was supposedly vacant, but firefighters found evidence that someone had been living in the structure, including mail in the mailbox and clothing and personal items inside, said McKeesport deputy fire Chief Gene Esken.
Crews were dispatched just before 8:30 p.m. and arrived to find flames visible in multiple windows, Esken said.
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October 01, 2021 |
By Jason Togyer | Posted in: McKeesport and Region News
The dispute between McKeesport Area School District and Pennsylvania Coach Lines is going back to court.
On Thursday — when buses on five different routes didn’t show up as scheduled — the district filed an emergency motion before Allegheny County Judge Arnold Klein asking for a court order to compel the bus company to provide service.
The district’s move came two days after Propel Charter School and Young Scholars of Greater Allegheny Charter School filed their own request for a preliminary injunction or special relief against the bus company.
In Tuesday’s filing, attorneys for the charter schools argued that students are suffering “immediate and irreparable harm” from being “stranded and unable to attend school.”
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September 28, 2021 |
By Siana Emery | Posted in: McKeesport and Region News
Tension was high at this month’s McKeesport Area School Board meeting, as citizens and board members alike aired their frustrations.
Several people, including resident Keith Murphy, voiced their concerns over the board’s decision in August to extend the contract of Assistant Superintendent Tia Wanzo.
“You did the equivalent of what Donald Trump did, with putting Kavanaugh and Barrett on the Supreme Court” before the 2020 presidential election, Murphy told the board.
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September 16, 2021 |
By Sarah Turnbull | Posted in: McKeesport and Region News
Dani Kramer, land-based program coordinator for Allegheny CleanWays, gives direction to a crew of “DumpBusters” cleaning up illegally dumped trash along Federal Street in the city. (Vickie Babyak photo for Tube City Almanac)
In just three hours last week, a team of “DumpBusters” removed more than 7,000 pounds of junk and 21 old tires from an abandoned home on Federal Street in McKeesport.
How did the team — including 13 volunteers from Compass AmeriCorps — keep from getting overwhelmed when confronted with all of that trash on Sept. 10?
Lexi Garcia, a native of Ann Arbor, Mich., said it helped to remember they were changing a community, a little bit at a time.
“It’s easy to feel hopeless about how one person can make a difference,” Garcia said. “But you have to keep that passion going.”
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September 14, 2021 |
By Jason Togyer | Posted in: McKeesport and Region News
Sheree Kegley uses cake decorating tools to finish one of her “dessert candles.” Kegley’s store, Bleuu Candles, is the newest business in Downtown’s re-opened Executive Building. (Tube City Almanac photo)
The sundaes, cupcakes, parfaits and birthday cakes at Bleuu Candles look good enough to eat — but you’d probably just better sniff them instead.
Everything — including the icing, the sprinkles and the cherries on top — are made of wax. Proprietor Sheree Kegley taught herself to make and decorate scented candles, in varieties such as tropical fruit, cinnamon, birthday cake, chocolate and peach, as a result of the COVID-19 lockdown in 2020.
“It was COVID-borne,” she says. “I lost both of my jobs during COVID, so I taught myself. I’ve been making candles for about a year now.”
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September 10, 2021 |
By Siana Emery | Posted in: McKeesport and Region News
Penn State Greater Allegheny students discuss their research with University President Eric J. Barron at the Ostermayer Laboratory on the McKeesport campus during Thursday’s open house. (Penn State University photo via Facebook)
Three years, one pandemic and $14 million later, a ribbon-cutting ceremony on Thursday marked the official completion of the renovated Ostermayer Laboratory at Penn State Greater Allegheny Campus.
The largest construction project in the history of the McKeesport campus, the renovation brings brand-new laboratory and safety equipment, modernized teaching and research spaces, improved classroom and collaboration spaces and an enhanced entrance and lobby space to the building, which was originally constructed in 1973.
Penn State President Eric J. Barron and Jacqueline Edmondson, Greater Allegheny chancellor and chief academic officer, presided over the ceremony. They were joined by Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald, McKeesport Mayor Michael Cherepko, State Rep. Austin Davis and state Sen. Jim Brewster.
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September 10, 2021 |
By Staff Reports | Posted in: McKeesport and Region News
The state Commission on Crime & Delinquency has added more than a half-million dollars to programs designed to curb gun violence and substance abuse in the Mon Valley.
Grants announced this week to the city of McKeesport and three local agencies will build on already successful programs, said state and local officials.
Officials said the city is currently in year three of the McKeesport Gun Violence Reduction Program, a five-year plan that includes community outreach, early intervention programs for youth and teen-agers, and additional resources for police and other law-enforcement agencies.
“The Pennsylvania Commission on Crime & Delinquency has been extremely supportive of the efforts taking place in McKeesport to curb the addiction to crime and violence,” McKeesport Mayor Michael Cherepko said.
“This additional funding announced (Wednesday) continues the city of McKeesport’s program through June 2022,” he said. “Our hope is that these initiatives that PCCD is funding will continue for years to come.”
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