Plan targets Belmont corridor

Other commercial areas were able to absorb the loss of large retail outlets, but not Liberty, the township administrator says.
By TIM YOVICH
VINDICATOR TRUMBULL STAFF
LIBERTY -- Township Administrator Patrick J. Ungaro wants to create a tax-saving designation in the Liberty Plaza area to attract business.
Ungaro said the area along Belmont Avenue, between Gypsy Lane and state Route 304, would benefit.
Julie Michael Smith, the governor's regional representative for the Ohio Department of Development, said other communities have used either enterprise zones or community reinvestment areas (CRAs) to help the business climate.
"It makes property more attractive," she said.
Michael Smith explained that while an enterprise zone provides for the abatement of both real and personal property taxes, real property can be abated in a CRA.
The township is eager to return the plaza and the area around it to the hub of retail sales it once was to increase the township's tax base.
In recent years the area has lost Ames, Phar-Mor, Kmart and Stambaugh Hardware stores along Belmont. Even restaurants such as the Boatyard are gone.
The plaza is all but empty.
"That's a key piece of property," Ungaro said.
Corporate troubles
The plaza and surrounding stores anchored Belmont's business district, Ungaro explained, noting the stores closed because of bankruptcies at the corporate level.
Ungaro said other communities with similar retail outlets were able to absorb the losses of the bankrupt stores, such as busy U.S. Route 224 in Boardman.
Ungaro explained that incentives must be offered to attract new business.
With the creation of a CRA, Ungaro said, real property taxes can be abated on all new improvements to buildings.
In discussing the area with others, "everybody agrees" that Belmont is vital to the township, he said.
Those discussions have included talks with Youngstown State University, Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber and Ohio Department of Transportation.
"I want to make the street look better," Ungaro asserted, noting that YSU wants to see improvements to roads leading to the campus.
Ungaro pointed out that sidewalks along Belmont are nearly complete and he has been discussing its resurfacing with ODOT.
Brochures will be created to help sell the township to prospective businesses, he said. They will draw attention to the tax incentives, educational system, new library, residential development and the future state Route 7-11 connector with an interchange at Belmont.
"I want to be more aggressive. You have to target the area," Ungaro said.
yovich@vindy.com