{"id":136608,"date":"2024-10-23T21:55:44","date_gmt":"2024-10-24T01:55:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/?p=136608"},"modified":"2024-10-23T21:55:44","modified_gmt":"2024-10-24T01:55:44","slug":"pa-senate-passes-freeman-bill-to-help-main-street-program-sends-it-to-governors-desk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/?p=136608","title":{"rendered":"PA Senate passes Freeman bill to help Main Street program; sends it to governor\u2019s desk"},"content":{"rendered":"

HARRISBURG, Oct. 23 \u2013<\/strong>\u00a0The Pennsylvania Senate passed legislation Tuesday that would allow communities to extend their participation in the state\u2019s Main Street program for up to a total of 10 years, according to the bill\u2019s author, state Rep. Robert Freeman.<\/p>\n

\u201cA community\u2019s Main Street initiative often just gets started with implementing its revitalization plan when the funding ends, undermining the ability to realize the plan\u2019s objectives. With the addition of this needed option of a program extension, communities would be better positioned to fully succeed in their objectives for revitalization and enhancements to downtown commercial areas,\u201d said Freeman, D-Northampton.<\/p>\n

House Bill 450 would give the state Department of Community and Economic Development authority to grant up to an additional five years for administrative costs associated with employing a Main Street manager if it determines that it would be beneficial to the community in reaching its revitalization goals.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am hopeful that the governor will sign my legislation into law because of how important added time in the Main Street program could be for communities to ensure that the plan is fully implemented, and the revitalization objectives are met,\u201d Freeman said.<\/p>\n

The Main Street Act was created to provide grants for commercial downtown revitalization efforts, including infrastructure improvements, marketing and promoting the established commercial downtown within the Main Street area, and fa\u00e7ade grants, all under the direction of a Main Street manager. Currently, grants for a maximum of five years may be made to support and implement the efforts of a Main Street manager.<\/p>\n

Freeman said Easton\u2019s successful Main Street program, which became nationally accredited in 2007, has been recognized with various awards from the Pennsylvania Downtown Center, the city of Easton, Lafayette College, Lehigh Valley Economic Development Corp., Pennsylvania Pursuits magazine, and Two Rivers Area Chamber of Commerce and was declared the No. 1 performing Main Street program in Pennsylvania four times.<\/p>\n

The bill moves to the desk of Gov. Josh Shapiro.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Information provided to TVL by:
\nTom Andrews
\nHouse Democratic Communications Office<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

HARRISBURG, Oct. 23 \u2013\u00a0The Pennsylvania Senate passed legislation Tuesday that would allow communities to extend their participation in the state\u2019s Main Street program for up to a total of 10 … Continue reading PA Senate passes Freeman bill to help Main Street program; sends it to governor\u2019s desk<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":111789,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[69],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-136608","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-in-the-valley"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Freeman.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136608"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=136608"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136608\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/111789"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=136608"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=136608"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=136608"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}