On Tuesday, Gov. Josh Shapiro (D-PA) held a press briefing in Bedford, Pennsylvania to announce an investment in the state’s economic development.
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00:00Yeah, go ahead. You're up. All right. Okay. Good afternoon, everyone. I'm Jeff Christ,
00:08chair of the Bedford County Development Association. Welcome and thank you all for
00:12being here today for an important and exciting announcement that will significantly impact
00:18Bedford County and our Commonwealth. We're honored to be joined here by Governor Josh Shapiro,
00:24who will unveil a major economic development initiative. But before we get started,
00:29I'd like to take a moment and acknowledge some of our special guests in attendance today.
00:35We have Commissioner Mike Stiles, Commissioner Deb Bachman, Commissioner J.R. Wink,
00:43and Mayor Bill Liebfried, along with Secretary Rick Seiger, John Approe, Regional Director of DCED,
00:52Dr. Paul Ruhlman, Bedford Area School District Superintendent, and Dr. Mike O'Dellick,
00:59from the Bedford County Tech Center. We have Eric Zimbauer, Chair, Bedford Township Municipal
01:05Authority, representatives from the offices of Jesse Topper and Pat Stefano. That's Aaron Wyant
01:13and John Frick, respectively. If we could have a round of applause for all those folks.
01:17Thank you all for your leadership, by the way, everyone. Today's a momentous day for Bedford
01:27County, and it's also for our region. And it's my honor to introduce and welcome an individual that
01:35was pivotal in making this possible. Please join me in welcoming the 48th governor of the great state
01:42of Pennsylvania, Governor Josh Shapiro. Thank you, Jeff. Thank you very much.
01:49Jeff, thank you very much. And I must say it is great to be back in Bedford County, particularly
01:55for an exciting announcement like we have today. I want to just take a moment at the beginning here
02:01to thank Betty Slayton, the President and CEO of the Bedford County Development Association. Betty,
02:08I wanted to give you a shout out because I know you have been integral to so much of the growth
02:13and development here in Bedford County. And I know this chapter in your life is about to come to an
02:19end and a new one will begin. And we're going to miss you. And we want to just wish you the very best
02:24in your retirement. So thank you for your work. We appreciate you.
02:30And I know Jennifer Marsh is going to pick up right where you left off and take us to even
02:35higher heights here. Jennifer, we wish you the best. And I'm looking forward to hearing some remarks
02:41from Mr. Chairman, Commissioner Stiles in a moment. I was saying before to Betty, this is an impressive
02:49team here in Bedford County. And we at the state level together, of course, with Secretary Rick Sager,
02:55we want to invest in things where we see local leaders coming together, public sector, private sector,
03:01our unions, our workers, everybody working together to be able to put a stamp on a project
03:08and get it done. And this is the kind of investment here that we want to continue to make right here in
03:14Bedford County with this strong group of economic developers who I know are fighting to compete and
03:22win right here in this region. And that's why I'm excited to be back here today to talk about the next
03:28steps in our Commonwealth's economic development growth. You know, when I took office as your
03:33governor a little more than two years ago, I wanted to make Pennsylvania far more competitive
03:37and far more successful on the economic development front. We knew that we needed to take four concrete
03:44steps to make that happen. First, we needed to have the right team in place. You're looking at the
03:50leader of that team here in Secretary Rick Sager, who leads our Department of Community and Economic
03:56Development. Together with Ben Kirshner, who leads our Office of Transformation and Opportunity,
04:01your one-stop shop for getting stuff done quickly in Pennsylvania. We brought together folks with
04:08vision and expertise. And then after having those people in place, we needed a plan. It had been about
04:1520 years since Pennsylvania had an economic development strategy. We have one now. We crafted it and we live
04:23by it. It focuses on investments in five key areas, energy and agriculture, robotics, manufacturing and life
04:32sciences. And importantly, and this is different from how it's been done in the past, we focus our investment in
04:39every corner of this Commonwealth, rural, urban and suburban. You see, I see promise in fields like this, just as I see
04:47promise in our high rises in downtown Philadelphia and in our suburban office parks that dot our communities
04:54across Pennsylvania. We got to stop picking and choosing between one or the other and start investing
05:00in all of them. And that's exactly what we're doing with our plan. Third, we needed speed. We needed to move
05:07at the speed of business. Pennsylvania had sadly earned a reputation of being too darn slow. We have changed that.
05:15We went from being bottom of the pack on our permitting process to being in the top five in the entire
05:20country. We now issue permits quickly and we have a money back guarantee, meaning we will tell you when
05:28you apply if it's going to take 14 days, 30 days, whatever it's going to take. And we will hold our
05:33bureaucracy, hold our government accountable to meeting that timeline. I must tell you, since we put this
05:40money back guarantee in place about a year and a half ago, we've only had to issue four refunds. We're
05:47very, very proud of that. We're also really proud of the fact that when you're doing a big development,
05:52when you're trying to look at a site that's really complex, nearly every time you require a permit
05:58through the Department of Environmental Protection. And go ask any developer, they would complain about the
06:03Department of Environmental Protection. They would say it would take just too long to get things done there.
06:10I want you to know that under the leadership of Secretary Shirley, we reduced our permit backlog
06:15at the Department of Environmental Protection by 88 percent from 2,400 permits that were just sitting
06:22on a desk to now less than 300. We have done all of this work and never had to issue a refund from
06:30the Department of Environmental Protection because they're now issuing permits on time. You can clap for
06:35that if you want. I will also say in all the businesses you have here in Bedford County and all
06:42across Pennsylvania, each and every one of them require at least one permit in common, a business
06:48license to be able to operate in Pennsylvania. The day that I was sworn in, that Rick was sworn in,
06:54it took eight weeks to get that business license. Today you can get it same day in the Commonwealth of
06:59Pennsylvania. We're moving at the speed of business. That was the third thing we needed, speed. The fourth
07:05thing and what brings me here today is we needed more resources to bring to bear to encourage and
07:11incentivize that growth. We had, our cupboard had run dry and our toolkit was really minimal compared to other
07:19states. And so I went to your representatives and I went to the House and Senate. And by the way, I should note, we've got a
07:26house led by Democrats, a Senate led by Republicans. I'm one of the only governors in the country with a divided
07:32legislature. Yet we were able to come together to invest a new billion dollars in economic development.
07:40Put together with the other resources we had, we now have a pot of nearly two billion dollars to help
07:45with economic incentives. And I want to give a special shout out to Representative Leader Topper,
07:51as well as Senator Stefano. They came together and voted for that bipartisan budget to be able to put
07:57us in a position to have more dollars to invest in communities like this. They're people I have worked
08:03with in order to advance the cause of economic development and much more. And I think you should
08:09feel privileged to have them as your elected leaders in this community. We appreciate them. And I want
08:14you to know that our work is starting to pay off. In addition to the public dollars that we've been
08:21able to bring to bear, thanks to the leadership of Secretary Seiger, we've leveraged those dollars
08:26to be able to bring in 3.7 billion dollars in private sector investment, creating over 5,000 new
08:34jobs across Pennsylvania. And I want you to know that that is just the start. When we look to add to our
08:40toolkit, we went around and asked the economic developers, the site selectors, the people around
08:45the country. I literally went to them and said, why aren't you choosing Pennsylvania? Why'd you go to
08:51another state? And they said, well, the truth is, you don't have sites that are kind of pad ready to go
08:58where you can bring a company in and say, here you go. Everything's hooked up. Everything's ready to go.
09:02We've got your energy. We've got your utilities. Everything is online. We didn't have those sites.
09:08We do now, thanks to a new 500 million dollar, a half a billion dollar Pennsylvania sites fund
09:14that we've gotten passed by the legislature and in place. And now we're in a position to be able
09:20to have pads ready. Now, we like to pressure test these things so we don't ever waste taxpayer dollars.
09:27Before going to the legislature and asking them for half a billion, we set aside 10 million dollars
09:33for site development. Secretary Seiger went out all across Pennsylvania and sought bids to see what
09:41we would do with those 10 million dollars. He got over a hundred different applications totaling 235
09:47million dollars of really quality projects. We use that to ask the legislature for this half billion
09:53dollar fund. They granted us that half billion dollar fund, which brings me to Bedford County today.
10:00I wanted to be here today to make the initial announcements for our Commonwealth's first
10:07tranche of awards of what we refer to as PA sites money, that half a billion dollars. The first tranche
10:14totals 64 million dollars and represents 11 projects across Pennsylvania. But I wanted to come to Bedford
10:22County today to announce the first site in our state. And that is for 2.8 million dollars for a grant to be
10:30CDA to be able to develop this land right here behind us. This is a big deal.
10:41We've seen the success of Business Park 1, which the Commonwealth invested in. We are now beginning
10:47to see the plans for Business Park 2. And I know Business Park 3 is on the horizon. And by the way,
10:53I must say for as talented as your economic development group is, you should pick your names a little bit more
10:59creative. I don't know. I mean, maybe one, two and three works. It's up to you. I'm not going to
11:03micromanage you. But that would be the only thing I could offer this great team. But look, they're out
11:09of room with Business Park 1. And we've got to see the vision for 2 and 3 forward. And the Commonwealth
11:15wants to be a part of that. And so as part of our PA sites program, we're going to be investing an initial
11:202.8 million dollars in this next phase. And we're looking forward to continuing to work with you
11:26for future phases. What these dollars will go to is extending water and sewer lines to this new site,
11:33providing companies that want to come here a pad ready site for their operations. Here in Bedford
11:41County, we are literally turning dirt into jobs. This is real freedom. This is real opportunity. And it is
11:50really happening in Bedford County, thanks to the great leaders up here and the commitment from the
11:55Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. I am proud of the fact that Pennsylvania is not only investing these
12:01dollars and creating jobs across Pennsylvania. I'm proud of the fact that folks are starting
12:06to really take note. We are now the top state in the Northeast for regional economic competitiveness
12:13by Site Selector magazine. Remember, Site Selector magazine used to look past Pennsylvania.
12:19Now we're being recognized as the best. Forbes has now rated us one of the best states in the country
12:24to start a business. And I hope they see the businesses we're starting here in Bedford County. Wallet
12:30Hub now recognizes our Commonwealth among the top three states for quality of life. CNBC puts us in the top 10
12:39states for affordability and literally the only state on the East Coast that bears that distinction.
12:45Our work is paying off and we are showing results. But I am competitive as hell. I must tell you, I want to be
12:51first in every category. And so I want to see more development here in Bedford County and all across
12:57Pennsylvania. So we're going to continue to call on lawmakers to invest in our toolkit. We're going to continue to
13:03find ways to be even faster. We're going to continue to work with the public sector and private sector alike to be able to spur on more economic growth.
13:11And we're going to continue to find ways to partner with great regional leaders like what you have here
13:17in Bedford County. So it is good to be back with you. Today is a great day to celebrate. Today is a day to turn
13:23this dirt into jobs and to see a great future of possibility and opportunity here in Bedford County.
13:29And I couldn't be more proud to be your partner and to be your governor. And so with that, it is my pleasure
13:36to bring up the aforementioned Betty Slayton. I hope the first question from the media is if she could
13:43be willing to delay her retirement to get to phase three, four, five and six. But no, I'm just kidding.
13:49We're grateful, Betty, for all of your work and we're excited for your future. And with that,
13:54Betty, I want to recognize you to say a few words. Thank you all very much.
14:02Thank you, Governor Shapiro. Big news, right? This grant is truly a game changer for Bedford County.
14:10It gives us the ability to develop and to proactively market new shovel ready sites. And that's something
14:19that's absolutely critical in recruiting and attracting new employers. You need to have the sites.
14:27With our with our existing business parks nearly sold out, we've missed too many opportunities
14:34because we simply didn't have the sites that could accommodate the needs of the prospects who are
14:40calling us. But now, now, thanks to this investment, we're back in the game.
14:47The successes we've experienced in the past have been the result of a strong partnership with the
14:54state. The state has not only helped us to develop the sites in our business parks, it's also helped us
15:01to market them as well. Projects like the Walmart Distribution Center, Captive Air, and REI came to
15:09Bedford County through the Governor's Action Team, now known as Business PA. Thank you Governor
15:16Shapiro for understanding what rural Pennsylvania counties need and for developing a program that
15:25meets these needs. Today's grant, today's grant lets us announce that once again Bedford County is open for
15:34business. Thank you. Good stuff. Thank you. Oh, and I got a little full of myself there. I'd like to introduce now the
15:44Secretary of the Department of Community and Economic Development, Rick Seiger.
15:48Thanks, Betty. Thank you. Great job.
15:52Well, thanks and good afternoon everyone. It's so good to be here. Thanks, Betty. Congratulations on
15:56your upcoming retirement. It's sad for us, great for you. Your leadership has really been critical here,
16:02especially if I've come into this job in these last two years, to move forward, not just this county, but
16:08really this region. And congrats to Jennifer as well for joining the team. I often say economic
16:13development is a team sport and we at the state are only as good as our partners. And in Bedford,
16:19you know, we're really good because of you. So thanks. There's a couple people here that haven't
16:23been acknowledged that, in my view, are really the stars of the show here. And that's Mandy Book,
16:28Ryan Emerson, and Brian Eckert, who are sitting up front here from our team.
16:30Mandy leads this team with Ryan and Brian to develop these sites. They manage our business
16:40financing programs. And they, over this past year, have stood up really historically significant site
16:45program. Thank you to you all. In addition to, of course, John and Pro, who was mentioned earlier,
16:48our regional director. And of course, thanks to you, Governor. It's really because of your leadership
16:53and dedication to this work that we're able to secure this funding and create this opportunity.
16:59And I will say, some of this has been said already, but it's worth repeating. Since we took office,
17:04we've listened to groups locally. We've listened to real estate professionals. We've listened to
17:08business, frankly, about what they need. What does it take for us to compete? And one of those really
17:14key takeaways, it's literally strategy one in our economic development strategy, is that we've got
17:19to have the product to compete. We've got to have pad-ready industrial sites. Without that inventory
17:26across Pennsylvania, businesses just don't have options to locate here. And they'll go somewhere
17:30else. And that's just not an acceptable outcome for me. And it's not an acceptable outcome for the
17:34governor. And it's not acceptable for our people. We've got to be able to compete for expansions of
17:41existing businesses and new businesses coming to Pennsylvania. That's why we started last year's
17:46pilot program. We recognize that overwhelming demand where everyone knew we had just $10 million to
17:52grand. We got $230 million of applications across Pennsylvania. And we worked in a bipartisan way
17:58to secure this historic site investment, the first dollars of which I'm extremely proud to stand before
18:04you today to announce. This puts us back in the game so we can really compete.
18:12And while I'm really proud to be a part of this first announcement, I want to be clear that there's much
18:16more to come. There's much more funding for sites, additional dollars all across Pennsylvania for great
18:21projects, projects that will attract more businesses, not just in big cities, but as the governor mentioned,
18:27in our rural areas like Bedford, and then the suburban areas as well. You know, we have a saying on our
18:33team, it's actually on my fleece today, which is that Pennsylvania gets it done. Yep, says it right here.
18:40It's official. Today is an example of how we're fulfilling that promise. We heard from you that we
18:46needed more sites. We worked on a bipartisan basis to secure the funding. And we are investing in
18:52Pennsylvania today and here in Bedford. It's an honor to be here with you all, especially with
18:56Governor Shapiro, to celebrate the first of many such announcements to come. We're so excited to keep
19:02this momentum and energy going. And as I wrap up here, I will just say, I mentioned early on that economic
19:08development is a team sport. We can't do it especially without strong local leadership. And it's my pleasure to
19:13introduce to close out our program, Commissioner Mike Stiles. Commissioner, please.
19:24Bedford County quickly rebounded after the 2020 pandemic. Our people made the difference.
19:30The support of federal, state, local government officials, along with a lot of forward thinkers,
19:36made things happen. BCDA and Betty Slayton, a big part of that, has developed relationships with various
19:44officials to promote economic growth for the county. BCDA has put plans in place to react when opportunity
19:53arises. Governor Shapiro's plan to make Pennsylvania more competitive with shovel-ready sites to promote
20:01industrial growth is a shot in the arm for BCDA and Bedford County. Bedford County, as you can see,
20:09is real estate ready. We have the location for this program and to put the plan into action.
20:16Governor Shapiro's PA sites initiative is just what's needed to move the ball forward. Another example of
20:24working together for a common goal. Together, we can build a better tomorrow for all. Thank you, Commissioner.
20:33Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And with that, we'd be happy to take some questions from the media.
20:38Betty, you want to handle this since it's your last?
20:44Anything from the media? Yep.
20:46Do you have any businesses committed to being located here yet or no?
20:53That I will defer to Betty. Not yet, not yet, but once this is, now that this is public,
21:00we will be marketing in conjunction with the, with business PA. I'm sure that once we're able to
21:08announce that it's coming, we will have a lot of interest because we have had, but we couldn't,
21:14we couldn't land them. You know, if you bring a company
21:18along this road here and you tell them to look out at this field and say, oh, we're going to
21:22set your company up here. Very hard for that company to look and say, yeah, I want to locate
21:28here because you know what? Time is money for them. They don't have time to go and build a bunch of
21:32stuff and hook a bunch of things up and check with the utility companies and figure out what's what.
21:38But imagine now they come out, they see a pad, it's ready to go. All the hookups are there.
21:43And all they got to do is tell us what kind of building they want to sell their,
21:47their product or whatever it is. They're going to be way more apt to choose Bedford
21:51County at that point. That's why these sites are so important. We see this dirt and we see
21:56opportunity. A business might see this dirt and kind of worry that there's too much risk for them.
22:01We want to de-risk that and give them a chance to succeed. And that's why this site's money is so
22:06important. Anything else? Yeah. What is the total projected cost for this project and where's the
22:14rest of the funding going to come from? I think that's probably a question.
22:19The total project cost thus far is a little over five million dollars. We have acquired the land
22:24for 2.2 million and so that's, that's our equity and using a PETA loan as well. We use the state loan to
22:31help off, join us with our equity and then this 2.8 million dollar grant is going to help us
22:38bring the water, sewer and the roads and to complete it. And just to clarify, the land cost
22:44is included in that five million? Yes, not the 2.8 million but we will, but it's independent of,
22:52in addition to. In addition to the five million? No, I'm sorry. Yeah, part of the five. The 2.2 is for
23:01the land, the 2.8 is, is doing the hookups and the roads and things like that. Correct? Okay, thank you.
23:08Anything else? Yeah, hey. What's kind of the timeline on board, timeline for it and exactly what will be the
23:15size of this kind of, in terms of the area covered? Betty, it really is. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I could go
23:22but really Betty will know better. Well, believe me, I'm thinking as soon and my board is here, many
23:27members of my, our board is here and we are going to giddy up. We're going to get the contract signed
23:32with you all and then the first step will be doing the engineering, getting the engineering of the site
23:38so that then we can go to bid and have contractors have apples and oranges that they can bid on the project
23:44and then we'll be ready to go. Jeff, you're an engineer. How long is it, how fast can we get the
23:50engineering designs done? Yeah, next week, yeah. You want to add some? By the way, he says Pennsylvania
23:55gets it done. You say we're going to giddy up. I think you should change your sweater. Yeah, that's
24:01pretty good. Go ahead. Look, I just want to say like the theory of the case here is, as the governor said,
24:06to kind of de-risk this project, right? So locally there's real dollars in this project, right? There's land
24:12that's assembled. We're able to come forward with dollars that can help de-risk this development
24:18for a future user and we think that that kind of multiple amounts of funds, right? State and local
24:25funds leveraged together really helps us win here. The goal here is to make this fully marketable so
24:33that the next time we have a terrific company looking to manufacture something, hopefully in one of these
24:38targeted sectors the governor's talking about, we can bring them here and they can develop that much
24:43faster because we have the right site in place. Anything else? Good Manuel? Yeah, I think we got one
24:52more here and then we'll wrap it up. I'm sorry. Is there, with this project, is there any talk to connect
24:58Route I-99 to I-68 to kind of bring traffic in for KS? Not right now, but look, we understand that
25:08PennDOT, our roads, our bridges, our infrastructure are absolutely critical to economic development.
25:14By the way, I'm proud of the fact that Pennsylvania last year repaired more bridges than any other
25:19state in the entire country. I told you I was competitive as hell. I'm glad we're number one on
25:23that and right now we're actually working together in a bipartisan fashion to have a big infrastructure
25:29bill that can pass both the House and Senate that includes investing in mass transit and investing
25:35in roads and bridges. We all understand the need to do both. And so that's an example of having more
25:41dollars available so that if an economic development project needs an added road, a slip ramp, a turn
25:49lane, whatever it needs in order to be successful to get its trucks in and out or to get, you know, workers
25:55to the site more easily, we want to have the resources available to do that. So we understand the importance
26:01of infrastructure. I think I certainly don't, you know, think I'm going on a limb speaking for them
26:08on this. I think Senator Stefano and Representative Topper also understand the importance of infrastructure.
26:13It's one of the things that has brought Democrats and Republicans together. And I think we're all going
26:17to work together to continue to enhance the dollars available for transportation projects here in
26:22Bedford County and across the state. Okay, great. Thank you all very much. Thanks, Betty.