The holidays are behind us, the calendar has flipped to a new year, and you know what that means—my annual top-10 list of Harrisburg news stories.
OK, maybe you don’t know that, but it has been a tradition in this column for over a decade.
So, have a seat, pour that last glass of eggnog before its sell-by date, and read through what I consider some of the top local news items of the past year.
10. Book Building
In 2019, on a sweltering August day, I stood at the corner of N. Front and Walnut streets as Dauphin County Library System officials announced an ambitious plan. They would buy the historic Haldeman Haly house next door, connect it to the existing McCormick Riverfront Library and renovate both buildings. The problem? They would need to raise about $3.5 million to make it happen. Three years later, mission accomplished. In October, DCLS unveiled the renovated, expanded library with new rooms, new spaces and a renewed vision for the future. As I’ve stated in past years, I like to begin this annual list on a positive note, and this was certainly positive news in Harrisburg over the past year.
9. Full House
When it comes to politics, we tend to stay in our lane here at TheBurg, focusing on city elections. However, in 2022, we extended that lane a bit to include state government races following a favorable redistricting for Harrisburg. The city now has two state Assembly members, an increase of one, with a third member based just over the city line in Susquehanna Township. I find this significant for several reasons. Sure, it gives Harrisburg greater representation in the statehouse, which is welcome. But it also demonstrates the rising political power of our urban area, as well as its quickly increasing diversity. Moreover, Harrisburg-centric legislative districts now include much of the metro area, offering more common ground between city and suburbs. We can only hope this marks the beginning of the end for the ridiculous, counter-productive, tired old west/east shore divide.
8. Pie in the Eye
Having grown up just outside New York, I consider myself something of a pizza snob. So, when I moved here, I was unimpressed by the offerings. Then came Knead, which I thought was even better than the pizza of my childhood. So, I happily feasted, especially with the snug slice shop located just across the street from my office. Then, one summer day, Knead’s dozen or so workers announced a plan to unionize; the business swiftly closed. Like many of our readers, I had never heard before of a corner pizza shop unionizing. In my New Jersey hometown, pizza joints were everywhere, each one seemingly run by some middle-aged guy named Tony and his two blockhead sons. Anyway, in the end, there were no winners in this sad saga. With the business shut, everyone lost: the owners, the employees, the customers and the city.
7. Fund Times
For nearly a year, residents awaited a plan for Harrisburg’s $47 million bounty, the city’s share of money from the federal American Rescue Plan Act. Then it came, in part. In June, City Council approved an administration plan to allot about $15.6 for a new HVAC system for the public safety building, for fire and police bonuses, and to reimburse the city for pandemic-related expenses. The administration has stated that it would like to use the rest for a waterpark at Hall Manor and for an affordable housing initiative. These proposals, though, have yet to be publicly detailed, teeing up a potential top news story for 2023. In late October, the city got more good news on the funding front. The commonwealth selected Harrisburg to receive a $13 million federal grant to upgrade several parks and convert the aging Jackson Lick pool to a spray park. That’s no play money.
6. Mending Bridges
Harrisburg is a river city, and that means bridges—lots of them. In 2022, PennDOT offered continual fodder for bridge drama. Early in the year, it released a proposal to rehab the Market Street Bridge, only to significantly change it a few months later to include an unsightly utility bridge. It also made public a plan to rehab the Maclay Street Bridge. But perhaps the biggest bridge news was PennDOT’s own-goal as it lost a court challenge to toll the South Bridge. Separately, the Harrisburg Area Transportation Study issued its four-year improvement plan, which includes transforming the long-dormant CAT bridge for bicycles and pedestrians. The Walnut Street Bridge also is set for rehab work, though I argued, in this space, for rebuilding the truss bridge’s western span, which was destroyed in a devastating January storm 27 years ago.
5. Apartment Block
Nearly every year, I include a “dog that didn’t bark” story on this list. In other words, something was expected to happen, but it didn’t. For 2022, that honor goes to the many large building projects that have been proposed, even approved over the last few years, but still haven’t broken ground. Residential projects along and near the Reily Street corridor top that list, though the inventory of drawing-board buildings touches most Harrisburg neighborhoods. Notably, the soon-to-be-surplus Federal Building went from auction block to opulent rehab plan and back to auction block, all within 11 months. Fortunately, it wasn’t all deflating news on the development front. Projects like the Menaker apartments, Midtown Lofts, Harrisburg University’s health sciences building and the new federal courthouse all either were completed or neared completion in 2022. Nonetheless, residents can be forgiven if they treat the next grand building proposal with a healthy dose of skepticism.
4. Semi-Normal
2022 will go down as the year that our nation returned to normal, more or less. Despite a rough start to the year, most Americans—and I’ll say most Harrisburgers—eagerly embraced their old ways once the winter COVID surge abated. Restaurants fully reopened, entertainment venues were packed, and nearly everyone stashed away their masks. Nonetheless, pandemic fallout continued. Businesses had customers again, but they often lacked the inventory, supplies and employees to serve them. Downtown Harrisburg, in particular, continued to suffer from a dearth of state and other workers who never fully returned to the office, leading to numerous business closings. For this reporter, this was some of the worst local news since the rumored demise of the legendary Harrisburg beaver.
3. Stately Stall
Each spring, flowers bloom, robins return, and road construction crews begin pounding, digging and paving. This past year was no different, except that the crews started and soon stopped on one project—the redesign of State Street in Allison Hill. A long-planned project to narrow the street, add bike lanes and improve safety caused some residents to complain that the new road would force them to move their parked cars twice daily along the street. The biking community pushed back, advocating for the project and the bike lanes. Other project supporters argued that the parking situation shouldn’t have been a surprise—that it had been presented over and over during many public meetings. In April, the city administration issued a cease-and-desist order and, in June, unveiled a revision that would eliminate the bike lanes and retain the parking. That plan added more safety features, such as textured crosswalks, but didn’t narrow the roadway, a key part of the original plan to make the wide, dangerous street safer for pedestrians.
2. New at the Top
The first week of 2022 held one of the biggest stories of the year—the swearing-in of Harrisburg’s 39th mayor, Wanda Williams. A change in administrations always elicits concern for what lies ahead. What will the new mayor mean in terms of policies, priorities, procedures? In my view, the new administration started off strong with a seasoned team of managers to lead government operations. It then built upon the main strength of its predecessor with continued sound fiscal policy, while repairing frayed relations with the county, the state and other entities. It was adept in providing core services, completing the vital 2nd Street project and—huge kudos—in securing grant money. For 2023, I’m interested to learn the details of the administration’s pending affordable housing plan and, importantly, to see if it can bring down 2022’s distressingly high homicide rate.
1. 2nd to None
Back in 1956, Harrisburg—egged on by the commonwealth—turned several local streets into high-speed mini-highways. Overnight, once-quiet roads became noisy and dangerous, and the city became far less livable. Properties along and near these routes lost value, and many once-lovely houses fell into disrepair. Harrisburg’s urban fabric was shredded for the benefit of commuters, who raced along these roads each night to their suburban homes. Sixty-six years later, in 2022, Harrisburg took a huge step in righting this historic wrong. Much of N. 2nd Street was re-designed, and the road was returned to two-way traffic. The impact was immediate and profound: fewer cars, less speed, less noise and a much safer street. In short, the road was given back to the city and its people. I now hope that this successful project offers proof of concept for slimming and slowing down the city’s other urban highways, including Forster Street, Front Street and the downtown stretch of 2nd Street.
So, there you have it. Another newsy year in the books and a fresh one just started.
Raise that last glass of nog, and let me propose a toast. Here’s to a great 2023 to our readers and to all the wonderful things this community can accomplish in the coming year.
Lawrance Binda is publisher/editor of TheBurg.
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