Progress

RALPH NARDONE Times Leader Correspondent

SCRANTON – The Greater Scranton Chamber of Commerce held a pre-bid conference on Thursday morning with 15 local developers to begin the construction process for a large-scale office project.

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Above is an aerial view of the proposed corporate site to be developed by the Greater Scranton Chamber of Commerce. When completed, a blighted tract near Scranton High School will be transformed into the Mount Pleasant Corporate Center, offering 200,000 square feet of space for area businesses.

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Above is an aerial view of the current corporate site to be developed by the Greater Scranton Chamber of Commerce.

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When completed, a blighted tract will become the site for the $30 million Mount Pleasant Corporate Center. It will offer 200,000 square feet of space for businesses, according to Austin Burke, president for the Scranton Chamber.

The chamber put up $3.5 million of its own money to purchase and reclaim the land, matched with $2 million in state grants from the Pennsylvania Department of Community and Economic Development, $1.2 million from the federal Economic Development Administration and $250,000 from the city of Scranton’s Office of Economic and Community Development.

The chamber tore down an old cinder block plant there last year and cleaned up miscellaneous mine waste left there by two coal breakers abandoned years ago, he added.

Burke said the complex will help bring 1,000 new jobs in the city and replace an eyesore across from the Scranton High School with attractive modern buildings.

Residents of the city will enjoy improved traffic patterns as part of the project, Burke said as the busy intersection from the McDade Highway connecting to Linden and Seventh Avenues is revamped.

Presently, three developers have expressed a high level of interest in setting up shop at the new property.

One is a local company seeking to expand and the other two are from outside the Scranton area.

The new complex will be set up with a Keystone Opportunity Zone designation for the next seven years offering tax breaks, Burke said. The property is already a KOZ and its designation was extended, he added.

At a recent Scranton City Council meeting, Andy Sbaraglia, a member of the Scranton-Lackawanna County Taxpayers Association, criticized the project saying the KOZ status offers “no benefit to the taxpayers.”

He added that Scranton does not need more office space to complement an existing abundance of empty office space currently in the city.

Burke said the KOZ status has become a standard demand of developers who say their tenants won’t even consider moving into the area without the tax breaks.

“If no KOZ, they are not interested,” he said.

In the current recession, the city can ill afford to make its properties less attractive to businesses that can easily elect to take their operations to neighboring states, he added.

Burke said the KOZ program has provided significant financial benefits. Over $1.64 million in tax revenues to local municipalities, school districts and Lackawanna County can be attributed to KOZs, he said.

If all goes right, the project should be completed in the fall of 2009, he said.

Details are available at www.scrantonchamber.com and www.scrantonplan.com.