[Evergrey]

http://www.centredaily.com/mld/centredaily/16510214.htm

Housing crunch grips area
Owning a home in Centre Region out of reach for many workers
By Mike Joseph
mjoseph@centredaily.com


Jim Litzinger zooms from his Clearfield County home to his North Atherton Street workplace every day, often making the normal 45-minute commute in half that time. He's been pinched for speeding.

But Litzinger won't hear of moving closer. "It's too expensive, way too expensive," he said, taking a break from a wheel alignment wrench at the Tire Town garage. "You can't find a house for less than $200,000 here."

Karen Ilgen, one of 100 or so people being displaced from the Mellott Mobile Home Park, thinks she's found another mobile home for herself, her daughter and her 2-year-old grandson.

The Centre Area Transportation Authority bus driver plans to move from her $4,000 trailer on North Atherton Street into a $20,000 mobile home in Bellefonte, farther from work. She'll pay less for lot rent, $185 a month instead of $265, but more to pay off the trailer.

"I wanted something nicer to last me a while," she said.

And Amy Farkas, Harris Township manager, who has Penn State undergraduate and graduate degrees, has looked in vain for a home she can afford in the township, where the median income is $62,000 a year and she makes $52,000.

An ordinance requires the municipal manager to live in the township, and Farkas would much prefer to put her $760 monthly apartment rent into a mortgage payment.

"If your community is economically gated, which is what we're becoming in this region, you're only going to have a certain type of people living in your community," Farkas said. "And when those people die off or move on or retire, what's left to take over the community?"

All three -- Litzinger, Ilgen and Farkas -- represent people affected by the lack of affordable housing in and around Centre County's economic center. The issue has commanded increasing attention in the past five years as wage increases have failed to keep pace with soaring land costs.

Wages vs. home prices

The situation shows no signs of easing.

"There's not a single person in the real estate business, not a single person in the building business, the developers, whatever, that don't acknowledge that there's an affordable housing problem," Bill Sieg, president of the Centre County Association of Realtors, said Friday.

"When you have land values that are $2 million, $3 million for a hundred, a hundred-twenty-five acres of ground," Sieg added, "and you put the infrastructure costs, you put the tap fees for the utilities, you get everything done -- you're looking at a price of $70,000 to $100,000 for a lot.

"Now you build affordable housing on a $100,000 lot? It's virtually impossible to do that."

The issue boils down to the growing ledger-sheet difference in what's coming in to live on, and what has to go out for a place to live.

The average wage in Centre County, from the second quarter of 2001 to the second quarter of 2006, increased 20 percent-- from $564 to $677 a week -- across the board, from motel room maids and kitchen workers to much higher paid company managers, according to the state Department of Labor and Industry.

The average price for a home across the entire county, however, from Philipsburg to Unionville to Bellefonte to Milesburg to State College, increased over the same five years by 39 percent, almost twice the wage increase rate, from $146,000 in 2001 to $203,000 last year.

But this widening gap widened more between the lower end of the wage spectrum and the place where most people work, the six municipalities that make up the economic center around Penn State. That's where Litzinger aligns, repairs and replaces tires, where Ilgen drives a CATA bus and where Farkas runs a township.

Company manager wages in Centre County rose 25 percent during the past five years, according to the Labor Department, while the average wage for Centre County accommodation and food service workers increased 16 percent, from $183 weekly in 2001 to $213 weekly in 2006.

Meanwhile, the average price of a home in the six-municipality Centre Region rose from $169,000 in 2001 to $238,000 last year, a 41 percent increase.

A place to call home

Farkas wants to spend up to $150,000 for a home but may "stretch" her resources "above my comfort level" to $170,000. She earned an undergraduate degree at Penn State's University Park campus in 1996 and a master's in public administration from Penn State Harrisburg in 2002.

She grew up in Hershey and worked first in Lancaster County. But she always wanted to return to the State College area to live and work. She began as Harris Township manager about 18 months ago, and she's been looking for a starter home since summer, as have many of her friends.

"We don't have the limitations that the folks that live in Mellott's trailer park have -- certainly, I have a place to live, and I'm very grateful for that," she said. "But I want to put down permanent roots in a community and be a taxpaying member of a community, and I'm basically being told there's no welcome mat for me. I can't do it here unless I make considerably more money or marry well."

Sieg, along with Centre County Board of Commissioners Chairman Chris Exarchos, attributes the lack of affordable housing in part to the effort to preserve farmland from development, even though he calls that effort a "lofty, good" goal.

"I don't want to see Centre County built to 100 percent of max, either," Sieg said. "But every time a farm is purchased where the development rights are purchased for 10 million bucks, it drives up the value of the developable land. So they've taken prices that were $10,000, $12,000 an acre up to $30,000 an acre. It has a ripple effect."

Exarchos said the county's housing crunch might be eased if farmland preservation were more effectively incorporated into the planning process.

"I don't think we're using farmland preservation in the right way -- it's being used for those who think we need to hold development, to make open space," he said. "True farmland preservation preserves the best soils.

"The problem is, we all work very hard to make a desirable community and people will want to move here," he added. "When they do come, they need housing, they need schools, they need water, they need sewer. Growth will occur, and if you try to thwart that, growth happens in a way you don't want it."

Sieg likes Exarchos' idea to set aside 100 acres of Rockview state prison land north of the Shiloh Road interchange for workforce housing to eliminate the high cost of land. It's an idea that is caught up in ongoing discussions by the state and Benner Township about what to do with the more than 1,800 acres of surplus Rockview land.

But it's an idea that will take a lot of giving, from government and private enterprise as well from buyers of such homes, who wouldn't profit as much from the increase in land values. Sieg and Exarchos say Centre County should tackle the problem to establish a model for the rest of the state.

"We sent a man to the moon," Sieg said, "We ought to be able to solve affordable housing."

Farkas, 32, placed herself among other young adults who are trying to establish roots in a community.

"It just seems like in the Centre Region we seem to have forgotten that everyone has to start somewhere, and so we're pricing people out of this community and saying you can't start here but you can come back when you make enough money," she said.

"It doesn't seem very right to do that because we're the next generation of this community's leaders -- it's your teacher, it's a police officer, it's a public employee, it's people that work for Penn State."

Mike Joseph can be reached at 235-3910.

[LostInTheZone]

oh god... pleeeeeease don't get me started on the way that State College manages 'growth'.

[Evergrey]

oh god... pleeeeeease don't get me started on the way that State College manages 'growth'.

I assume I would agree with what you potentially have to say.

[EastSideHBG]

oh god... pleeeeeease don't get me started on the way that State College manages 'growth'.
Yeah I completely agree...

[markdv]

The housing crunch is way out of control. Greedy landowners selling to big developers who can afford to pay top $$$. A suggestion, head southwest across the Seven Mountains to the Lewistown area. Although old and a little run down Lewistown has excellent highways, good schools , outdoor recreation , beautiful developments and fairly priced land. The people are friendly, and a little chubby. A 35 minute drive to State College. Lewistown is more than a SC bedroom community and will grow as other State Collegians discover the secret.
A new self-contained development is planned for Reedsville. More info. on Lewistownsentinel.com

[architorture]

yeah i really liked the areas south of state college... wide open and hilly

[EastSideHBG]

It's interesting to see the transformation that part of PA is going through right now, that's for sure!

[giovanni sasso]

i'll echo the blanket sentiments of litz, evergrey and eastside. state college's growth over the past 20 years has really been about as abysmally planned and short sighted as anywhere in the country. small town sprawl is in many ways far worse than large city sprawl, most especially in happy valley where, as the article mentioned, farmland is extremely valuable and important.

it's interesting that the mellott mobile home is mentioned by name. i didn't know those people were being displaced, but i suppose it had to happen sooner or later. north atherton is really exemplary of the type of development that has happened in state college, and i'm willing to wager that whatever replaces the trailer park will be on par with all the other mcmansions just past that part of town.

when 99 is finished between skytop and bald eagle, i really hope that people working at the university and in state college will consider ownership in tyrone borough. there are tons and tons of opportunities, and even plenty of room to built anew, but something tells me that 99% of people living out there would rather buy a house in a development on a mountainside than live with neighbors in some crusty old town.

[Evergrey]

when 99 is finished between skytop and bald eagle, i really hope that people working at the university and in state college will consider ownership in tyrone borough. there are tons and tons of opportunities.

...speak of the devil... (though the non-Tyrone content of this article is positively frightening)

http://www.centredaily.com/mld/centredaily/16563765.htm

Housing needs spill over
By Mike Joseph
mjoseph@centredaily.com

As Centre County leaders struggle to find housing that people who work here can afford, the marketplace just outside the county is already taking care of business.

Listen to Dave McNitt, a Philadelphia-area lawyer turned entrepreneur who plans to start moving ground next fall to turn 97 acres of Mifflin County cropland, off the Reedsville exit of U.S. Route 322, into a "community" with 400 homes priced from $125,000 to $225,000.

With typical State College-area home lot prices going for $100,000, McNitt said, and with lot prices accounting for up to one-fourth of home prices, it's no wonder that so many State College-area homes are selling for about $400,000.

"That has priced out of the market what I call the workers of Centre County," he said, "and so we're going to provide for them an option that is 20 to 25 minutes south of State College."

And just off Centre County's southwestern flank, along the other transportation axis through central Pennsylvania, Interstate 99, the borough of Tyrone hasn't gotten much bigger or smaller during the years. But it's in the midst of a demographic makeover.

As older Tyrone residents sell single-family homes and move into redeveloped apartment houses, their homes are snapped up by younger folks who'd rather face the 25-minute commute to the State College area than the price of a home there.

Penn State has become the biggest employer of Tyrone residents, according to the borough's comprehensive plan. The average sale price of Tyrone homes increased 12 percent from 2005 to 2006, compared with a 7 percent increase in State College-area homes, according to the Centre County Association of Realtors.

"The homes are being purchased by people who work in State College, who travel over to there to the university, because our cost of living is not as high as what it is over there in the Centre area," said Tyrone Borough Manager Sharon Dannaway.

McNitt and Dannaway could be part of an affordable housing chorus line around Centre County. Although the county's growing economic center attracts more and more jobholders, the high costs of land and housing keep many newcomers to the area outside the county line.

In Huntingdon County, which has 48 municipalities, the municipality with the most new home permits for 2006 was Warriors Mark, a township with no real estate tax and a township that is far from Huntingdon and Mount Union boroughs and Raystown Lake but right next to Centre County.

"Strong growth continues," said Huntingdon County Planning Director Richard Stahl. "We have a substantial number of people in Warriors Mark who commute out."

As many new residents to the area decide to live near but outside Centre County, land-use decisions within the county have not yet eased the housing price crunch for families with incomes ranging from $37,000 to $74,000.

A proposal for the Grays Woods residential development in Patton Township last summer would have mixed homes affordable to people with such incomes with higher-priced homes, but grass-roots opposition from Grays Woods residents killed the plan.

One of the remaining farms in the Centre Region, the 82-acre Harpster farm at the corner of Earlystown Road and Boal Avenue in Boalsburg, will be developed into a planned residential community, with 282 dwelling units that include single-family, duplex, triplex and quadriplex homes without any consideration for affordable housing needs.

Caught up in the Centre County debate is a question about whether or how much farmland preservation contributes to the high cost of land. That debate could soon spill over into other counties as well.

Bill Sieg, president of the Centre County Association of Realtors, thinks the purchase of development rights of farms has a ripple effect that drives up the cost of land left in the market.

Norm Lathbury, coordinator of the county's Agricultural Land Preservation Board, said that argument fails to recognize that the amount of preserved farmland is comparatively small. It also fails to recognize that only the best agricultural soils are preserved, he said.

The farmland preservation board in the past 18 years has purchased the development rights on 31 farms, totaling 5,305 acres, at a cost of $9.7 million, or $1,831 per acre, Lathbury said, considerably less than the $5,000 an acre that Philadelphia-area developer Traditions of America paid for the Harpster farm in Boalsburg.

Lathbury calculated that in the 28 years between 1975 and 2003, almost 20,000 acres of land of all types was developed in the county for homes and commerce alike. He called the 5,305 acres of preserved farmland "a drop in the bucket" by comparison, and said none of the preserved farms was in the path of development at the time the easements were recorded.

All 11 preserved farms in Ferguson Township are in an agricultural protective zone and cannot be developed, Lathbury said, and the remaining 20 farms are in Harris, Spring, Potter, Benner, Walker and Marion townships. He said only one farm was purchased from a developer at market value.

Lathbury now has more company to share his farmland preservation concerns, for Centre County's worries over the loss of it have begun to spill outside the county, along with residential growth plans.

In Mifflin County, Reedsville-area developer McNitt said that when the 97-acre family farm was zoned agricultural in the early 1990s, it was offered for sale at its fair market value as farmland.

"There were no takers," he said. "Keeping this parcel in agriculture was not an economically viable option."

William Gomes, Mifflin County planning director, said he's "a little puzzled" because "historically this county has not grown a lot, but suddenly we have a lot of interest in it."

"We have several subdivisions on the table right now, and we don't know why," Gomes said. "The question is: All these developments are coming forward in the last six months, and we're not really sure what triggered them, other than land prices are higher in other places."

With McNitt's and other plans taken together, Gomes added, developers envision up to 1,400 more residential housing units in Mifflin County.

"If we get as many units as they're saying right now, then it's going to have some impact on this county," he said. "I have a concern that we'll end up losing some of our farmlands before they're ready to go."

Mike Joseph can be reached at 235-3910.

county-to-county migration
http://enterprise.star-telegram.com/ARCIms/Maps/clt/2007/irsmig.asp?state=PA

[markdv]

Sounds like there's alot of potential growth for Mifflin County ! Great news ! I live in central NJ, midway between Philly and NY, and can't wait to get back home to Lewistown. Looked at a new development off 322 in Reedsville, great prices and beautiful settings. 30 miles south of State College and 65 miles north of Harrisburg. A great bedroom community for both metropolitan areas.

[LostInTheZone]

are people on this site actually advocating longer commutes as a solution to a housing shortage?

[markdv]

I am advocating that future homeowners in and near State College consider Lewistown / Mifflin County, just over the Seven Mt's. There is presently no daily commuter bus service but I'm sure some ambitious entrepeneur will realize the need for such if the Mifflin County manages to steal away some homeowners. The commute would be about 35 minutes. I commute an hour each way right now and would love a 35 minute commute. Sorry if this upsets anyone. I do more than my part to conserve in other ways.

[giovanni sasso]

that's not just ANY 35 mile commute either -- that's over seven mountains. fog, snow, sleet, heavy rain ... lotsa fun driving up 322 in all of that, yessirree. those two lanes between potters mills and boalsburg are a barrel full o' monkeys with traffic too.

nobody is going to dispute that central PA is an autocentric culture because it has to be, but that doesn't leave a blank check to go develop over the mountainsides. it's really indicative of both the cultural divide and the power that townships wield when so many people in centre, mifflin, huntingdon, blair and neighboring counties welcome such open ended development with no real thought to consequences. just take a drive between warriors mark and toftrees on 550 if you want to see what beautiful farmland looks like when it's paved over with big plastic homes spaced 50 feet apart and named after the farm they were built upon.

yeah yeah, people want their space in the country. just like everyone else who wants their space in the country. the notion of community centers in the central PAs of the US is resigned to town centres and that is just sad. as i said earlier, tyrone borough -- and altoona city and philipsburg and lewistown and milesburg -- these places already have an infrastructure that can be built upon, developed and improved, including commercial space. huntingdon and bellefonte should be used as models.

but they probably won't, tyrone perhaps being an exception once 99 is complete. there is just too much of a stigma attached to urban living, and that is exactly what all those places are, regardless their small stature. people want the country, but what they're getting is suburbs and calling it country.

grays woods ain't country, buddy.

[PA Pride]

How can such an isolated town in the middle of farmland be short on homes?
I live in an urbanized major metro area with tons of big companies and lots of people always coming and going, and we have way more land than we even need. (I'm talking about eastern Beaver County and Western Allegheny County which is just unmolested farmland and still no one will buy it or develop it).

[markdv]

Mr. Sasso,
FYI, I was born and raised in Lewistown, commuted to Penn State from Lewistown for 4 years and made even more trips to visit family north of SC. Only 2 times in my recollection has the Seven Mt's been closed due to inclement weather. I'm sure the big highways in major cities are closed much more often due to mo0tor vehicle accidents. You obviuosly have a chip on your shoulder as evidenced by the tone of your response. SOme of these communities have been depressed for years , and yes, the chance to see my hometown prosper ( anyway it can ) excites me.

[giovanni sasso]

eh? do you understand what i said? i want lewistown to do well.

i was born and raised in tyrone and went to school in shippensburg. i know all about the depressed communities of central PA, thanks. have you been to altoona? altoona is a wretched place. its core is lifeless and pock marked, and its only growth is through clear cutting and the creation of retail centres that look like retail centres everywhere else in the country. and people there love it, even seem embarrassed of downtown altoona.

because of state college's success and growth, it COULD happen in lewistown and tyrone and the other communities i mentioned. people could regrow the boroughs that are the reasons families still live there, but given penn state's demographic, it seems more likely that people buying in mifflin county would rather develop a farm than live in the existing town. when people build developments in the country, people need amenities. when people need amenities, they build new shopping centers and strip malls.

it's great to be excited about your hometown's growth, but i think doing so "anyway it can" is unhealthy. things can be done well so they should be done well. cul-de-sac growth 5 miles outside of lewistown does nothing to grow lewistown.

the sense of community evaporates when this kind of growth is encouraged. don't take my word for it -- the article speaks for itself.

A proposal for the Grays Woods residential development in Patton Township last summer would have mixed homes affordable to people with such incomes with higher-priced homes, but grass-roots opposition from Grays Woods residents killed the plan.

so many levels of disgusting.

[LostInTheZone]

personally, I think a great solution to struggling towns is to build expensive 6-lane bypasses with flyover junctions around around them, so that they won't be inconvenienced by any visitors who might be passing through and stopping at a diner or antiques store to spend money.

[LostInTheZone]

also, less sarcastically, places like Lewistown and Tyrone would be much more on the radar of State Collegians(?) if Amtrak advertised the fact that it's usually faster and cheaper than the bus, and ran shuttle busses to connect a huge market of young people without cars to its two closest train stations. Having more than one train a day stop there would be nice too. Having the one and only rail line crossing the state running through your town ought to be treated as a huge asset. Instead, it took a couple years for me to figure out that there WAS an Amtrak stop in Lewistown, and I'm the kind of person who pays attention to such things.

[giovanni sasso]

well you can thank your US president for the fact there's only one train passing through tyrone, huntingdon and lewistown (all relatively equidistant from state) each direction each day. there were three when i moved to philadelphia six+ years ago, and though i still use amtrak to travel home, i no longer have a choice about WHEN i do.

something like that would be less on amtrak than it would penn state. PSU should partner with amtrak for an on-campus marketing blitz, something of a "hey, at least it's not greyhound" approach, and then commission CATA or fullington or SOMEone to run a shuttle from TYR/HDG/LEW to state.

still, how many post-graduates are actually staying in the state college area? that's a stat i'd be interested to learn. i think the last one i read for all philly schools combined was something like 11%, and that is just horrible.

[Evergrey]

still, how many post-graduates are actually staying in the state college area? that's a stat i'd be interested to learn. i think the last one i read for all philly schools combined was something like 11%, and that is just horrible.


Surely you must have this number wrong... is this just for the city or the metro? For comparison, the Pittsburgh metro retains 52% of graduates from PGH metro colleges and universities*... up 14% from 1994... even elite Carnegie-Mellon... which only draws 9% of students from Metro PGH... retains 20%. 33% of graduates with "no ties to the area" stayed in the region. I know Philly has a lot of elite schools that draw students from outside the region who are likely to leave Philly... but 11% is a shocking number. 11% is what I would guess for Penn State / Centre County.


*based on a 2003 survey of 1999 graduates
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/today/s_448668.html

[markdv]

Such is the cost of economic progress. Maybe we have to give up farmland to increase the tax base and eventually see positive results. Noone is forcing land owners to sell. I do not advocate unplanned growth but realize that too much government control puts out the fire on many potential developments. We should be willing to at least listen to the developer, see how he works with the county, and give much consideration to the proposal. A positive change usually brings about others ! Let's be positive and expect the best. Please remember, people from all over the world view these pages and base opinions on our public debates and rants. There's a time and place for everything and maybe we all need to practice a little self-control and think before we type.

[Wheelingman04]

^ You are right. The more growth you have, the more sprawl you will have.

[Evergrey]

http://www.centredaily.com/116/story/50455.html

Increased population yields new challenges

Region bucks population trend as leaders mull future hazards

By Anne Danahy - adanahy@centredaily.com

http://media.centredaily.com/smedia/2007/03/24/19/78-273-032507population_photo.standalone.prod_affiliate.42.jpg
A for sale sign signifies an open lot in the Forest Heights subdivision in Zion. New population figures show a 3.8 percent growth in Centre County. CDT/Christopher Weddle


When meteorologist Elliot Abrams was a student at Penn State in the late 1960s, a DJ would come on the radio and talk about the area's three permanent residents celebrating New Year's Eve.

That was a bit of an understatement. Even so, the number of people living in Centre County has almost doubled since 1960. As of July 1, 2006, the county's population had reached 140,953 residents, according to population estimates released last week by the U.S. Census Bureau.

That's 3.8 percent more than on April 1, 2000. Centre County is continuing to grow at almost triple the rate of the state, which had a sluggish population growth rate of 1.3 percent. Centre County also stands out from most of its neighboring counties, where fewer people are living than six years ago.

"We're a little island of growth in the rust belt of the state," said Anson Burwell, a county planner, after pointing to a map of current and proposed housing developments around the county.

Penn State, the area's largest employer, and the businesses that spin off of it usually receive most of the credit for the county bucking the regional trends of economic hardship. County Commissioner Steve Dershem said the growing popularity of retiring in the area helps.

"I think we're becoming a pretty attractive retirement area, too," Dershem said. But, he said, "there are concerns both at the municipal and the county level that we're going to have some challenges as the population continues to age."

Those challenges are being felt most acutely by boroughs throughout Pennsylvania, which are seeing slumping populations even as surrounding areas grow. According to 2005 estimates, Bellefonte, for example, saw its population drop from 6,382 in 2000 to 6,161 in 2005. (The U.S. Census Bureau has not released 2006 population estimates for individual municipalities yet.)

"Our biggest problem is we're landlocked," said Frank Halderman, Borough Council president. "We just don't have room for development."

Halderman said he was at a recent meeting of the Pennsylvania State Association of Boroughs where other officials talked about being in the same position: declining population and tax base, leaving officials with the distasteful choice of raising fees and taxes or cutting services.

"You're always between a rock and a hard place," Halderman said.

Other areas of Centre County have seen growth that more than offset declines in some of its boroughs and townships. Most Centre Region municipalities are still seeing a rise in the number of residents. According to 2005 census estimates, Halfmoon Township, for example, saw its population grow 23 percent, from 2,365 residents in 2000 to 2,902 in 2005. Patton Township saw 9 percent growth in that period, and Ferguson Township saw an 11 percent increase.

In the Nittany Valley, Spring Township saw a 7 percent increase, and Walker Township's population jumped 13 percent.

Abrams, chairman of the Patton Township Board of Supervisors and an AccuWeather executive, said he thinks the area can continue to grow.

"I've been here 40 years, and it's grown ever since," he said. "It was a small town. I think, compared to many cities, it's still a small town. I think we still have a comfort level in this region, where if you say you're going to the mall or downtown, people know where that is."

Ferguson Township Supervisor Richard Killian said it isn't a question of whether to grow, but how to do it. Growth is OK, he said, if it's done in a way that's sustainable and preserves the environment and area's quality of life.

"Growth must be planned with a long-term perspective, including comprehensive planning, zoning, affordable taxes, and facilitating a healthy environment," Killian said in an e-mail.

Growth can also bring its own problems, including a deteriorating tax base, sprawl and expensive infrastructure. Killian said Ferguson Township has been fortunate to have income from property taxes growing faster than costs.

"We're lucky now, but we may not be lucky in the future," he said.

Municipalities across the state are facing the dilemma of not having enough money to pay for services, according to reports released today on Pennsylvania's economic prospects.

One of those studies, a Brookings Institution report, found that while the state has seen some economic improvements in recent years, it continues to lag in many ways.

Mark Muro, a policy analyst with the Washington, D.C.-based research organization, said boroughs and cities are continuing to empty out as outlying regions grow. Economic growth is slow compared with the national average.

The report was released with a Penn State study on rural issues and a Pennsylvania Economy League report on the state's financial picture. The Brookings' profile of Centre County notes that while the area's second class townships are growing, the boroughs are "hollowing out." That has led to a 20 percent loss of rural land between 1980 and 2000.

The PEL study, "Structuring Healthy Communities," describes the economic decline many municipalities face. According to PEL, most of Centre County is fiscally healthy. But, the report argues that even municipalities that don't have money problems now they could end up with stagnant or declining income and rising costs as development drops and residents' demand for services rises.

One recommendation is for the state to update the regulations governing municipalities and their taxing abilities.

Kerry Moyer, the Pennsylvania Economy League's director of research, said one of the things the study shows is that municipalities need to work together to have better economic development and deliver services more efficiently. The study says that can happen without actually merging municipalities.

"Regional approaches would better allow leaders to meet the needs of their residents," according to the report. "Administrative functions, development management and land use planning, tax administration and collection, resource management such as sewer and wastewater management, and public safety functions are just a few examples of services that may be shared and administered at a regional or multi-municipal level."

That's already happening in some parts of Centre County. The county Planning and Community Development Office encourages municipalities to work together on land-use planning, save money on services by paying for them together and get access to more grants by applying for them jointly.

"You just can't go it alone anymore," said Bob Jacobs, county planning director.

"I think the biggest fear municipalities have is they're going to lose autonomy," Jacobs added. But, he said, that is not what happens.

Bellefonte and nearby townships, for example, are part of the Nittany Valley Planning Commission and have been working on joint land-use planning. Recently, they've started talking about paying for shared services, such as the public swimming pool.

Penns Valley municipalities also have a comprehensive plan, and municipalities in the lower Bald Eagle Valley recently formed a council of governments. In the Centre Region, municipalities have a council of governments and share parks and recreation services, public transportation and the library.

Anne Danahy can be reached at 231-4648.

[Evergrey]

http://www.centredaily.com/116/story/51920.html

COG tackles affordable housing debate

By Mike Joseph - mjoseph@centredaily.com
The regional government organization around Penn State took up the affordable housing issue Monday with debate beginning immediately about how many homes will be needed and whether the coming discussion should range outside the six-municipality Centre Region or stay within.

"It's hard any more for a family to find housing in this community for under $150,000 or $160,000," Bob Crum, director of the Centre Regional Planning Agency, told 25 elected leaders on the Council of Governments general forum.

Crum, summarizing some of the key points of the affordable housing movement, told the elected officials that a family of four with an income of $49,350 in Centre County can afford only a $150,000 home, according to federal guidelines saying housing costs shouldn't exceed 30 percent of income.

But the average price of a home in Centre County tops $190,000, and the average price of a new home in the county exceeds $245,000, Crum said, while a lot of the new jobs are low-paying service industry jobs.

"We have an income gap," Crum said. "The prices of houses are rising faster than incomes."

By the year 2030, he added, the county will need 2,000 affordable homes to meet population growth and house police officers, teachers, and restaurant and health care workers in order to maintain a healthy and diverse work force.

The Centre Region alone -- State College and the townships of College, Ferguson, Halfmoon, Harris and Patton -- has 5,500 vacant acres within its growth boundary and up to 70 percent of that land is zoned residential.

"Can we take a portion of that and set it aside for work force, more affordable units?" Crum asked.

Ferguson Township Supervisor George Pytel, whose municipality requires 10 percent of housing in a new traditional neighborhood district to be affordable, said he sees the affordable housing movement "almost as an enticement to get people to move into the Centre Region" and worried it might create a "slum."

"If they move here, what happens to Tyrone," Pytel said. "This is a double-edged sword."

Crum replied that "if you desire to live close to work, we should be able to provide you that opportunity."

State College Councilman Thomas Daubert said COG members should not be hearing from each other -- State College will make a presentation on its affordable housing programs next month -- but should instead be hearing about housing in outlying areas such as Bellefonte.

Ron Filippelli, also a State College councilman, asked why public transit systems are not providing commuter buses between Altoona and other areas and State College, an idea that has been discussed but never funded.

"This would take some of the pressure off affordable housing," he said.

College Township Councilman David Koll, a home builder, said many $130,000 homes have been on the market for three months. He added that "these are nice homes" and called a housing inventory to see how much of the goal is already in hand.

"We've been told we need 2,000, yet we're not being told what we have now," he said. "We don't know what we have to begin with. More on top of what?"

Mike Joseph can be reached at 235-3910.

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i was just there last week and i was surprised how much it has even changed in a couple of years when you drive around