Grocery tops Hill group's wish list for Penguins Arena area
The One Hill Coalition intends to roll out its blueprint today detailing what Hill District residents want before they agree to live in harmony with the Penguins' proposed $290 million arena.
Topping the list of requests is a "full-service grocery store," a state-of-the-art YMCA akin to the Homewood-Brushton Program Center, a guarantee that Hill District residents will have first crack at arena jobs and a "Livable Hill Community Improvement Fund" of an unspecified size.
"We expect to receive benefits in all of those areas," said Carl Redwood, director of One Hill. "If there's no agreement, we won't support the plan for the arena."
The group's list is to be detailed publicly today for the first time. It will serve as a blueprint for negotiations Sept. 25 with officials from Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, the Penguins and the Sports & Exhibition Authority.
This is also the first time One Hill has sent a detailed, consensus opinion of requests to the groups in power to grant them. The list went out Sunday to the public focus groups that helped develop it and stressed its most fervent wish, a grocery store, Redwood said.
Penguins spokesman Tom McMillan said the team and government officials are open to One Hill's hopes but not ready to make a firm pledge.
"Our role at the beginning of this process is to listen," McMillan said.
As for building a grocery store or community center near the 28-acre arena site, he said it could be one or the other initially.
"We realized what happened in the late '50s," McMillan said, referring to when the Civic Arena was built, displacing a thriving residential and cultural hub in the Hill. The arena opened in 1961 and is the oldest in the National Hockey League. "That won't happen again, and this time, the community will be engaged."
The Penguins will have a job-training program for local residents, but it's uncertain whether they will receive hiring preference, officials said.
Mayor Luke Ravenstahl and Allegheny County Chief Executive Dan Onorato have said all job and development requests are possibilities.
One Hill's request says money from the improvement fund would pay for development, youth services, education and drug and mental health services.
The amount of money is under negotiation, Redwood said, as is the composition of the panel that would control the fund. Public officials balked earlier this year when a separate group of Hill District ministers seeking a community benefits agreement asked for a $10 million fund.
The One Hill Coalition, which claims 320 volunteer members and dozens of groups, wants residents to be able to enforce the community benefits agreement and make more suggestions -- such as developing environmentally friendly buildings, using parking garages instead of surface lots and allowing hotel, restaurant and industrial unions to extend their contracts to the new arena.
"Now it all just needs to be negotiated," Redwood said.
Construction of the arena is set to begin in the spring. It is to open in time for the 2010 hockey season.
Topping the list of requests is a "full-service grocery store," a state-of-the-art YMCA akin to the Homewood-Brushton Program Center, a guarantee that Hill District residents will have first crack at arena jobs and a "Livable Hill Community Improvement Fund" of an unspecified size.
"We expect to receive benefits in all of those areas," said Carl Redwood, director of One Hill. "If there's no agreement, we won't support the plan for the arena."
The group's list is to be detailed publicly today for the first time. It will serve as a blueprint for negotiations Sept. 25 with officials from Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, the Penguins and the Sports & Exhibition Authority.
This is also the first time One Hill has sent a detailed, consensus opinion of requests to the groups in power to grant them. The list went out Sunday to the public focus groups that helped develop it and stressed its most fervent wish, a grocery store, Redwood said.
Penguins spokesman Tom McMillan said the team and government officials are open to One Hill's hopes but not ready to make a firm pledge.
"Our role at the beginning of this process is to listen," McMillan said.
As for building a grocery store or community center near the 28-acre arena site, he said it could be one or the other initially.
"We realized what happened in the late '50s," McMillan said, referring to when the Civic Arena was built, displacing a thriving residential and cultural hub in the Hill. The arena opened in 1961 and is the oldest in the National Hockey League. "That won't happen again, and this time, the community will be engaged."
The Penguins will have a job-training program for local residents, but it's uncertain whether they will receive hiring preference, officials said.
Mayor Luke Ravenstahl and Allegheny County Chief Executive Dan Onorato have said all job and development requests are possibilities.
One Hill's request says money from the improvement fund would pay for development, youth services, education and drug and mental health services.
The amount of money is under negotiation, Redwood said, as is the composition of the panel that would control the fund. Public officials balked earlier this year when a separate group of Hill District ministers seeking a community benefits agreement asked for a $10 million fund.
The One Hill Coalition, which claims 320 volunteer members and dozens of groups, wants residents to be able to enforce the community benefits agreement and make more suggestions -- such as developing environmentally friendly buildings, using parking garages instead of surface lots and allowing hotel, restaurant and industrial unions to extend their contracts to the new arena.
"Now it all just needs to be negotiated," Redwood said.
Construction of the arena is set to begin in the spring. It is to open in time for the 2010 hockey season.