MAHONING VALLEY Home Builders Association sets its sights on moving

HBA needs more space to increase training.
THE VINDICATOR, YOUNGSTOWN, OHIO
BOARDMAN -- The Home Builders Association of Mahoning Valley hopes to move into the former Cold Metal Products office building on South Avenue.
The HBA has signed a deal to buy the building for $290,000, and a hearing was scheduled for today in federal bankruptcy court in Youngstown.
The HBA board of directors has approved financing for the purchase if it is approved by Judge William T. Bodoh, said Mike Wilson, HBA executive director. The HBA also has a buyer lined up for its headquarters on Idlewood Avenue in Austintown, he said.
HBA officials want more room because they are providing more training, he said. Classes are expected to increase even more if a pending state law requiring licensing and continuing education for contractors is approved.
The Austintown office, which the HBA built in 1973, has two floors with 1,800 square feet each. The HBA occupies one floor, and three tenants occupy the other.
The former Cold Metal building has 4,500 square feet and a large multipurpose room, which will be good for training, Wilson added.
The building once was Cold Metal's corporate headquarters and then home to its accounting and computer management staffs. About 30 people worked in the office before the company closed its steel-processing operations earlier this year.
Cold Metal was unable to emerge from bankruptcy protection and is selling its assets to pay lenders.