Munhall
Last link in Great Allegheny Passage
By Jon Schmitz, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Allegheny County and Sandcastle Waterpark are expected to announce an agreement within days that will allow completion of the last missing piece of a biking and hiking trail linking Pittsburgh and Washington, D.C.
“I really expect we’ll have a formal announcement in the next couple days,” said James Judy, vice president of operations for Palace Entertainment, owner of the park.
“I believe that is probably going to be the case,” agreed county spokesman Kevin Evanto.
The deal would cap years of negotiations aimed at finding a way to accommodate the trail on the park’s narrow strip of land between a railroad line and the Monongahela River.
The roughly one-mile stretch is the last link in the 150-mile Great Allegheny Passage from Pittsburgh to Cumberland, Md., where it connects to the C&O Towpath to Washington.
When all is complete, it will be possible to bike about 335 continuous, mostly flat miles from Pittsburgh to the nation’s capital without interference from motorized traffic.
The former owners of Sandcastle for years resisted efforts to build the trail through the park, saying there wasn’t enough room.
“The next time you visit Sandcastle take a close look at the tight access road and try to visualize a 10-foot-wide trail running between the road and the railroad tracks. I hope you will conclude that not having the available land wide enough for a trail does not make us stubborn,” said Peter McAneny, then-president of Kennywood Entertainment, in a 2008 letter to the Post-Gazette.
[ Full story available at: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10194/1072356-455.stm?cmpid=HBEHTML#ixzz0tZOYFJWt ]
Parents and community leaders plan after-school program for middle schoolers
By Vivian Nereim, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
| Jim Cannistraci, executive director of the Methodist Union of Social Agencies, poses for a portrait Sunday inside the gym, which is owned by the Steel Valley Council of Governments. |
The aging gymnasium is an unlikely place to hold the hopes of a community. The walls are faded orange and the basketball hoops have long been out of service, bare backboards with painted-over graffiti. It is cold in the winter and stuffy in the summer. The floor is uneven, coated with dust.
But parents and stakeholders in Homestead believe that with enough money and hard work, the empty gymnasium off 17th Avenue could become a haven for their children, who have little to do after Steel Valley Middle School lets out except sit in the Carnegie Library or wander the streets.
“If they’re not somewhere safe, then they’re on the corner, or they’re watching somebody fighting,” said the Rev. Terry Groce, the mother of a 12-year-old boy and a 14-year-old girl.
For more than six months, the Rev. Jim Cannistraci has been formulating a plan to give Steel Valley Middle School students a safe space to stay after school, supervised and well-fed.
“None of us want to have to go through another school year and not have a place for our kids,” said Rev. Cannistraci, executive director of the Methodist Union of Social Agencies (MUSA), an organization that has provided services for the Mon and Steel Valley for eight decades.
With the school year fast approaching, Rev. Cannistraci and his allies are searching for enough funding to turn the gymnasium into a state-licensed facility where MUSA can host an after-school program for middle schoolers until 7 p.m., Monday through Friday.
[ Full story available at: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10193/1072156-55.stm#ixzz0tTPLbNty ]
By Michael DiVittorio,
McKeesport Daily News (via Trib)
Homestead police have identified a Steel Valley Midget Football Association coach who is facing gun and drug charges in connection with a raid of his borough home.
Police Chief Jeff DeSimone identified Terrence Waddell, 26, of 314 W. Twelfth Ave., Monday morning as the suspect who jumped from a second-story window and landed on his head in an attempt to elude officers executing a search warrant on Friday.
Waddell suffered wrist, head and back injuries as a result of that attempted escape. He was transported to UPMC Presbyterian, and was transferred over the weekend to Allegheny County Jail, where he is being held on $500,000 bond, DeSimone said.
Waddell faces charges of possession of marijuana, possession of drug paraphernalia, possession with intent to deliver, felony weapons charges, two counts of receiving stolen property, and possibly other charges in connection with the Friday incident, police said.
DeSimone said a collaborative effort among Munhall police, Homestead police and informants led to the investigation that ended with Waddell’s arrest.
[Full story available at: http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/dailynewsmckeesport/s_675108.html]
By David Whipkey
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Some parents of children attending Steel Valley middle and high schools will be seeking alternative methods of getting the students to class later this spring.
Beginning April 4, the Port Authority will discontinue the 55D West Run-Brierly Lane and 61F Homestead Park bus routes as part of the agency’s Transit Development Plan. According to Steel Valley Superintendent William Kinavey, about 60 students from both the middle and high school use Port Authority service to get to and from school.
Resident Gerry Hawkins asked the school board last week if anything can be done to help those students affected make it to school in a safe manner should no bus service be available.
“This has been reported all through the media,” Ms. Hawkins said of the service changes in Homestead, Munhall and West Homestead. “I know we do not have school buses in the district.”
Board officials said they planned to contact Port Authority to explore possible alternative transit options for affected students.
“I think that we should definitely have a meeting with the Port Authority to see what we can do,” school director Michael Terrick said. “We need to give the parents tools that can help secure some kind of transit to school for their children.”
[Full story available at: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10063/1040014-55.stm]
Two administrators in the Steel Valley School District learned a lesson last week about social media and the eyes it can provide to the public.
On Feb. 9, someone took photos of Steel Valley director of facilities Dennis Keesecker supervising the plowing – with the use of a school district truck – of the driveway at the Munhall home of Mark Cherpak, director of operational services for the district.
The event was captured several days after a major snowstorm dumped about 2 feet of snow on the area and at a time when many homeowners in the district were still digging themselves out.
The photos, nine in all, were taken from a vantage point across from and above Mr. Cherpak’s home. Some appear to have been shot through a screen.
They were posted on the Facebook page that is linked to the Munhall News Watch website. The website is maintained by Munhall resident Larry Rettger and is not affiliated with the municipality.
No one is sure who posted the photos; the posting name could not be verified.
[ Full story available at: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10049/1036526-55.stm?cmpid=neighborhoods.xml ]
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A collection of news articles focused on the communities of Pittsburgh’s Steel Valley.