Wellsville Area March Luncheon

Thursday – March 31: The Wellsville Area Chamber of Commerce held their monthly luncheon this past Thursday. The luncheon was held at the Dairy Queen located at 400 Third St. Chamber President Randy Allmon presided with Paul Blevins giving the invocation.

Allmon announced that the Chamber Board of Directors approved a $1,000 donation to the Potter Player's Liberty Theater renovation project. Allmon stated it was “seed money” to help get the renovation project started. See our post dated March 29 for more information on the Liberty Theater project.

The annual Chamber sponsored rabies clinic will be held Saturday, May 21, in the parking lot of the Holly Development property at 1210 Main St. That is the old Sky Bank. More details will be forthcoming at the April luncheon. The cost will remain $10 for each inoculation.

Chamber member Erin Roberts-Orr was the Chairwoman for the first ever trade show. It was held last Thursday evening. Orr announced they had 33 vendors registered for the event. We'll have more on that in a later post.

Allmon welcomed the Wellsville Lions Club as the newest member. The Lions Club have long dedicated themselves to community service. They annually hold an eye sight screening for students in the Wellsville school district and every Christmas holiday season have the Care & Share program, just to name a couple. That Care & Share program raises funds for toys and complete Christmas dinners for many.

Business of the Month went to Wellsville's McDonalds.

Keynote speaker was Don Crane, President of the Western Reserve Building & Construction Trades Council. Headquarters for that organization is in Youngstown and includes union members from Cleveland to Jefferson County and the northern panhandle of West Virginia. Crane is on boards and committees on a long list of organizations. In January he was appointed to the Port Authority board and is on the Building & Finance Committee of Eastern Gateway Community College (EGCC). Crane is pictured above with Chamber President Randy Allmon.

Crane announced that EGCC is looking to locate in Columbiana County, probably closer to East Liverpool. Headquartered in Steubenville, the college is the former Jeff Tech. They are now a fully accredited college offering courses for many two year Associate Degrees, some for Bachelor Degrees plus certified trades. EGCC has been expanding all over the area since coming into being and have been establishing cooperative programs with many other schools. Crane noted that EGCC is a perfect fit for students graduating from the CC Career & Technical Center in earning their certificatons or degrees in their chosen fields.

Crane reported that the Port Authority is continuing to buy properties for the proposed Baard Ohio River Clean Fuels plant. He noted that the Authority has just successfully purchased a large parcel of land from a recent Sheriff's Sale. The proposed plant will be located just outside of Wellsville and will convert coal and biomass to liquid fuel. It's a $6 billion project that will go on-line in two years in the first phase of construction. It is expected to take five years to completely finish all the planned units. Eventually Baard Industries will buy the properties from the Port Authority.

Crane noted he sees good things in the plant, not only for the construction trades but for the whole tri-state region. He expects more good news to be announced within the next month. State Senator Jason Wilson noted the only thing holding up the Baard project was the economy when he visited us a few weeks ago. With the recession making it difficult to line up funding the project has been held up nearly three years.

Allmon put in a plug for the Liberty Theater Association renovation project asking that maybe the trade council would consider helping complete the electrical system renovation. Crane said they were looking for a project and would like to take a look at the old building. Chamber member Mayor Joe Surace thanked Crane and all the union members for being good neighbors to the Village.

The April luncheon will be held Thursday, April 28 at Kat's Kitchen. Kat's is located at 1025 Main Street.

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