Proposed Trumbull JEDD puts focus rightly on future

The ongoing dismantling of the Mahoning Valley’s largest and sole-surviving blast furnace at the former RG Steel plant in Warren quite naturally beckons nostalgic sentiments from our region’s glory days as a leading national center of steel production through much of the 20th century.

But as the Mahoning Valley has painfully learned all too well over the course of the past four decades, too much focus on the past – and unrealistic hopes for its duplication in the future – have accomplished little other than to stall needed rejuvenation of massive tracts of land upon which our behemoth smoke-bellowing steel mills once ruled supreme.

That’s why it is very encouraging to witness a focus placed squarely on the future for the 1,050 acres first developed in 1912 as the Trumbull Steel Co. that later morphed into Republic Steel, Warren Consolidated Industries, Severstal Steel and RG Steel. Unlike many other redevelopment projects for former steel factory land in our region and elsewhere, the planning has begun in earnest even before the last remnants of RG Steel, which shuttered operations in 2012, have been fully bulldozed and cleared.

PROMISE OF TRUMBULL JEDD

News this week that Howland and Warren townships, along with the city of Warren, have met for two months to map out the creation of a joint economic development district for part of the expansive RG property forges realistic hopes that the land can be put to realistic and productive alternative uses for our 21st century economy.

“This is a great example of communities working together to further economic development and encourage growth,” Howland Township Trustee Rick Clark aptly said during an announcement event Tuesday at the Pine Street Southeast entrance to the site.

In addition to the three communities, BDM Warren Steel Holdings, which bought the former mill out of bankruptcy several years ago, also has been an active player in the early negotiations and planning for the setup of a JEDD. Its participation toward the mutually rewarding goal of redevelopment and jobs creation no doubt will help speed progress.

Such intergovernmental cooperation demonstrated so clearly this week among the partners must continue full throttle progressively through the many legal, logistical and technical hurdles that undoubtedly remain.

Now that the vast majority of the plant has been demolished and about 400 acres of the property have been targeted for initial redevelopment, the real work begins. That includes drafting a JEDD agreement suitable to all parties and then having it approved by the governing boards of each community.

The JEDD structure, a fixture in Ohio law since 1993, has succeeded in many communities to revitalize once prime industrial and commercial properties. Like the proposed Warren JEDD, all parties enjoy benefits. The city benefits in that it receives a portion of the taxes levied in the JEDD without having to annex it. The townships benefit because they do not lose prime development land, can still collect property taxes as well as a portion of the income tax collected, and can gain access to critically needed water from the city.

In the Mahoning Valley, the most recent success story involving a JEDD took root in Canfield. There, city and township officials entered into a joint agreement by which a nursing home company would construct a 72-bed facility employing nearly 100 people. Earlier this month, township and city leaders there celebrated groundbreaking for the 60,000-square-foot Windsor House facility.

Short of JEDDs, intergovernmental cooperation also played significant roles in the redevelopment of two former Youngstown Sheet & Tube mills in Campbell and Youngstown. In Campbell, cooperation among that city, Struthers and Lowellville led to the successful development of the CASTLO industrial park. At YS&T’s former Brier Hill Works, intense negotiations and teamwork between Youngstown and Girard led to more than a $1 billion investment in the modernization and expansion of the facility into a leading U.S. center for the operations of France-based Vallourec.

Eyes on similar prizes at the RG Steel site should provide motivation for participants in the JEDD to pursue their mission with cooperation, focus, patience and vigor.