August 16, 2024 |
By Adam Reinherz | Posted in: McKeesport and Region News
Editor’s Note: This is a developing story and is subject to change.
Who is McKeesport Area School District’s superintendent? Days after community members demonstrated support for MASD Superintendent Tia Wanzo at a school board meeting, rumors swirled regarding the educator’s continued employment with the district.
The school district advertised a special meeting at 7 p.m. Thursday to discuss “personnel” matters, but parents who tried to attend the meeting were told it was canceled.
Calls and messages to board members about Wanzo’s status as superintendent have gone unanswered — as have attempts to reach Wanzo.
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August 15, 2024 |
By Adam Reinherz | Posted in: McKeesport and Region News
Joanne Dorazio and family from White Oak attend International Village all three nights “and eat our way through.” (Vickie Babyak photo for Tube City Almanac)
Lt. Gov. Austin Davis said Wednesday he wished that every reporter in Pittsburgh was at Renziehausen Park in McKeesport to attend the city’s 64th International Village.
“I wish I could get every news camera in the Pittsburgh region here at International Village to cover this,” said Davis, a McKeesport resident and McKeesport Area High School alumnus. “Oftentimes they cover the bad things that happen in McKeesport, and there are so many more good people and good things that happen here. Oftentimes they don't tell that story and this is an example for people to see up close and personal what McKeesport is really about.”
Familiar faces came to a familiar place on Wednesday evening, as community members and elected officials descended on Renziehausen Park for the second day of the 2024 International Village. Founded in 1960, the annual ethnic festival — complete with food, music and dancing — draws thousands in search of summer fun.
Tube City Online is providing live coverage each night from 5:30 to 9 p.m. via YouTube.
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August 15, 2024 |
By Jason Togyer | Posted in: McKeesport and Region News
UPMC McKeesport is celebrating the grand opening of a new, state-of-the-art wound-care clinic in the Mansfield Building. The facility is double the size of the previous location in the Painter Building. (Submitted photo courtesy UPMC.)
UPMC McKeesport has doubled the size of its wound-care clinic and expects to be able to treat about twice as many patients with slow-to-heal injuries — including bone infections and people suffering complications from diabetes and poor circulation — than ever before.
The new clinic, located on the sixth floor of the hospital’s Mansfield Building, will hold an open house from 4 to 6 p.m. today (Aug. 15) to explain the facilities to visitors and offer free health screenings.
The first 50 attendees receive a free gift. Foot-health checks will be offered, along with cholesterol and glucose screenings, as well as tours of the clinic’s treatment areas.
“This has been a consistently growing program and a consistently growing clinic for us, but there are always opportunities for us to build greater awareness within the community,” said Joseph Vermilya, senior director of operations for UPMC McKeesport and UPMC East.
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August 14, 2024 |
By Adam Reinherz | Posted in: McKeesport and Region News
(Adam Reinherz photo for Tube City Almanac)
Residents packed a McKeesport Area School Board meeting on Tuesday to demonstrate support for district Superintendent Tia Wanzo.
With school scheduled to begin in just a few days, rumors have begun swirling that Wanzo’s job may be in jeopardy.
McKeesport resident Julian Thomas championed Wanzo during Tuesday's board meeting.
“I've had the privilege as a police officer to work side by side with her for over a decade, and I'll tell you, there's nobody more fit to run the school. I support her 100 percent,” he said. “Me and her disagree probably more than anybody else sitting at the table, but I support her 100 percent to be the superintendent of the school.”
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August 14, 2024 |
By T.J. Martin | Posted in: White Oak News
Lost dogs and cats that are found in White Oak now have a greater chance of being reunited with their owners following a donation from a local animal welfare group to White Oak Borough.
Gray Paws Sanctuary has donated a microchip reader to the borough. The case containing the reader, a handheld device that looks somewhat like a magnifying glass, will be mounted to a wall in the municipal building lobby so that it will be available for use 24 hours a day and seven days a week. The device will be attached to the case by a cable and the lobby is also monitored by a security camera.
Microchips are about the size of a grain of rice and placed beneath the skin of dogs and cats, usually between the shoulders, by a veterinarian using a syringe, similar to giving an animal a vaccination.
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August 11, 2024 |
By Adam Reinherz | Posted in: McKeesport and Region News
(McKeesport Area School District photo)
With the 2024-25 school year set to begin, McKeesport Area School District is reassuring parents busing will not be a problem.
During last week’s open agenda meeting, district Superintendent Tia Wanzo said a conversation with Krise Transportation last month established that “We are set and ready.”
According to its website, the transportation provider has open positions for van and bus drivers in McKeesport. Although the company is seeking new hires, Wanzo is confident transportation should proceed relatively smoothly.
“They kept the routes that we had last year and there aren’t many internal changes,” she said.
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August 09, 2024 |
By Yousuf Lachhab Ibrahim | Posted in: McKeesport and Region News
McKeesport is holding an event to encourage residents to visualize the future of the city's Downtown area that's more in line with its residents’ wants and needs.
The survey is being taken by the Texas-based Better Block Foundation, in collaboration with the City of McKeesport, Penn State Greater Allegheny and the Richard King Mellon Foundation.
It is open to McKeesport residents, and is available on the Facebook page for the City of McKeesport as well as the Better Block website until Aug. 21. Results will be announced Nov. 23.
The goal is to temporarily showcase the potential of the intersection of Fifth Avenue and Walnut Street — including a parking lot, several buildings, and an alleyway — before and after the Salute to Santa Parade in November.
Krista Nightengale, executive director of Better Block, said that the transformation of the intersection will be informed by the responses residents provide in the survey.
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August 09, 2024 |
By Staff Reports | Posted in: Crime and Police News
An East Hills woman faces a string of charges after McKeesport police arrested her and charged her with racing her car back and forth on Fifth Avenue and Lysle Boulevard on Wednesday night.
Jasmin Reese, 34, of Eymard Street, Pittsburgh, also is accused of driving under the influence of alcohol and assaulting the police officer who attempted to cite her. She is currently free on non-monetary bond pending a preliminary hearing Aug. 26 before Magisterial District Judge Eugene Riazzi.
In a criminal complaint, police state that an officer was monitoring traffic on Lysle Boulevard near Coursin Street around 10 p.m. when a maroon SUV with a loud muffler went east on Fifth Avenue at a high rate of speed.
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August 08, 2024 |
By Staff Reports | Posted in: Crime and Police News
A North Versailles Twp. teen-ager who was reported missing on Wednesday was found dead two hours later inside a Monroeville apartment.
Allegheny County police allege that Joselyn Thomas, 18, was shot fatally by Albert Williams III, 19, of Wilkinsburg inside a residence at the Cambridge Square Apartments off of Mosside Boulevard.
Wiliams is being held in the Allegheny County Jail without bond pending a preliminary hearing Aug. 23 in Pittsburgh Municipal Court. Thomas’s death has been ruled a homicide, the medical examiner’s office said.
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August 07, 2024 |
By Jason Togyer | Posted in: McKeesport and Region News
The Rankin Junior Tamburitzans performed during the 2021 International Village. The ethnic troupe will return to the main stage at Renziehausen Park next week. (Vickie Babyak file photo for Tube City Almanac)
Fashions come and go, trends rise and fall, but McKeesport’s International Village rolls on after 64 years.
The annual summer ethnic food and music festival returns to Stephen Barry Field in Renziehausen Park on Aug. 13, 14 and 15. Gates open at 3 p.m. nightly.
Ethnic traditions represented at this year’s International Village include Austrian, Croatian, Egyptian, French, Filipino, German, Ghanian, Greek, Hawaiian, Hungarian, Italian, Lebanese, Mexican, Polish, Swedish, Taiwanese and Vietnamese.
Fireworks are scheduled for Tuesday evening.
“International Village is one of those unique traditions that attracts visitors to McKeesport from throughout Western Pennsylvania,” McKeesport Mayor Michael Cherepko said. “In fact, we know that many people who have moved away from McKeesport or Pittsburgh plan their family reunions or vacations around the week of International Village every August.”
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