By Keith Gushard

Meadville Tribune

There are two words Mark Turner wishes were never associated with the Keystone Regional Industrial Park in Greenwood Township — “shovel ready,” meaning it’s ready for a prospective tenant to begin a building project.

“It’s haunted me,” says Turner, executive director of the Economic Progress Alliance of Crawford County, which owns the industrial park that’s been under development since 2000. Turner joined the Alliance in 2004.

This is the fourth year the Alliance is keeping the same top goal — landing the first tenant for the 1,300-acre industrial park.

While Keystone still awaits its first tenant as the site is developed, the Alliance continues to have success in other areas. It landed more tenants at Crawford Business Park in Vernon Township and sold off land in West Mead Industrial Park for development. Despite a down economy, the Alliance also help process $2.6 million in loans for projects at nine area firms in 2008.

What continues to hold Keystone back from landing a tenant is the lack of infrastructure — namely water and sewer lines and roads — at the park, said Turner.

When the Keystone was first being set up in 2000, Sue Ferry, a past executive director of Meadville Area Industrial Commission (one of the Alliance’s predecessor agencies), often billed it “shovel ready,” meaning a prospective tenant just basically had to put up a building.

There is a water tower, some water lines and an access road off Adamsville Road leading into a 223-acre area where HON Industries, a Muscatine, Iowa-based office furniture manufacturer, bought 80 acres in January 2001.

However, it is a water well system only for that 223-acre area. Though it still owns that land, HON hasn’t built yet.

“It just never worked out for us,” said Steven Bradford, vice president general counsel of HNI Corp., HON’s parent firm. Bradford said HON is working on an agreement to sell the property to another party, but doesn’t know when the deal may close.

“It was absurd,” said Turner. “Obviously, it was not shovel ready. It was more promotional than reality. I think the perception we created ourselves made it difficult to deal with.”

Bill Bragg, president of the Alliance board of directors, agrees, but points out part of the park was ready for industry.

“The whole park was not shovel ready,” said Bragg. “We’re only getting a water system ready now.”

“I was not involved with it, but HON was ready to go,” Bragg said, noting that the part of the park where HON was to build did have a water tower and localized water wells for that 223-acre area.