All Afloat: Relax away the stress, the strain at Dissolve.

May 31, 2018 | by Karen Hendricks

Kelly Martin was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis more than 25 years ago.

So, when the 53-year-old Middletown woman heard about floatation therapy from a co-worker—and found a discount for Camp Hill’s Dissolve Float Spa on Groupon—she decided she had nothing to lose.

“I immediately fell in love,” Martin said. “Floating in the water takes the pressure off your joints, the warmth of the room surrounds you, and it’s stress relief—that’s the trigger for arthritis.”

She’s been going to Dissolve, located on Market Street, twice monthly for the past 18 months to help manage her symptoms.

So what exactly is floatation therapy? Dissolve owner Michael Heiter said that the concept is pretty simple.

“You basically step into a pod, lay back and float,” he said.

But the operation behind the float is much more complex.

The facility has several private float rooms, each containing a pod filled with 200 gallons of water, measuring 10 inches deep, plus a key ingredient—the equivalent of 900 pounds of Epsom salts or magnesium sulfate. The salinity of the water provides a gravity-free float in body-temperature water that lasts about an hour.

Heiter, 47, of Carlisle, said that he was working in a stressful job as a medical device representative, helping to run equipment for surgeries, when he tried floating for the first time at a facility in Bloomsburg.

“It was an amazing experience, probably the most peaceful moments I’d had in my life,” he said.

As a result, he and his wife Tracy decided to bring floatation therapy to central Pennsylvania. The couple spent about eight months searching for the ideal property before discovering Camp Hill’s former Masonic Lodge.

“It’s built extremely well, with almost no windows, made of concrete and steel,” he said. “It needed to be well insulated for quiet.”

Through adaptive reuse, the 1936 structure was transformed into Dissolve Float Spa and opened in May 2016, the first spa of its kind in the area. Dissolve now schedules 400 to 500 floats monthly.

“People say it’s life-changing,” Heiter said. “It’s like a reset or reboot, mentally, physically and spiritually.”

Clients use floating to relieve symptoms of chronic pain, back pain, fibromyalgia, PTSD, Lyme disease, arthritis and other medical ailments, he said. But visitors don’t need a medical reason to come—many people just want to unplug and de-stress.

“A lot of people today struggle with being able to relax,” Heiter said.

Dissolve’s pods are equipped with tranquil music, which helps clients drift into a nap-like zone. Or visitors may choose to turn the music off and relax in quiet stillness.

Pods, often described as large and egg-shaped, feature lids that may be lowered during use. The pods are white and equipped with low lights, which helps prevent a feeling of claustrophobia if the lids are down.

A voice recording signifies when it’s time for visitors to exit the pod, rinse the salinity off in a shower—located within the same room—and get dressed. Clients may choose to wear a swimsuit, or not, while floating.

Massage is also offered at the spa.

Massage therapist Jennifer Hara said her services, including Bowen therapy bodywork, complement flotation therapy.

“Massage and bodywork prepare you for the deeper relaxation (of floating),” she said.

Hara herself has tried floating. She says it’s an “incredible” experience thanks to sensory deprivation—the removal of stimuli.

Cindy Reitz, 61, of Carlisle, was diagnosed with fibromyalgia more than 20 years ago. She also has orthopedic issues that have led to three back surgeries.

“I hurt all the time,” she said.

Last summer, her husband suggested she try floating, and she took to it instantly.

“Nothing else manages the pain (like floating),” she said, adding that her husband remarks that she looks visibly different afterwards.

Reitz now visits Dissolve three times a week.

”One of the things I love about it is, after I get out, I don’t feel heavy or tired,” she said. “I’m energized and moving with more fluidity.”

She said that she tells everyone she knows about floating and the “fabulous, professional” staff at Dissolve.

“I’m so grateful to them and this facility,” she said.

It’s a sentiment that Martin echoes.

“Floating has definitely added to my quality of life and gives me an option other than traditional medicine,” she said. “Besides escaping to the beach, it is my favorite place to get away.”

Dissolve Float Spa is located at 2211 Market St., Camp Hill. For more information, visit www.dissolvefloat.com or call 717-730-0600. If you have any questions regarding your medical condition and whether floating is right for you, please consult with your doctor.

Pumped Up: Local firm Andculture purchases, plans to renovate, relocate to Old Waterworks.

May 30, 2018 | by Lawrance Binda

The Old Waterworks complex on Front Street.

The King Mansion, the Moffitt Mansion, the “Mary K” mansions.

In recent years, these iconic Front Street buildings have been purchased, restored and reoccupied.

You can now add to that list a singular Harrisburg property—the historic Old Waterworks building.

Today, the owners of Harrisburg-based Andculture closed on the purchase of the sprawling, 22,000-square-foot building, one of only two structures in Harrisburg within Riverfront Park, directly fronting the Susquehanna River.

After a full building renovation, the design and engineering company plans to relocate its 55-person staff from its long-time downtown home at N. 2^nd and Locust streets.

“We are very excited about this,” said David Hickethier, co-owner of Andculture. “This has been a long time in the works.”

The building has been on and off the market for several years. However, the sales process was accelerated once the prior owner, Mann Realty Associates, filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in January. According to Dauphin County, Hickethier and his partners bought the property from Mann Realty for $1.25 million.

A view from inside the Old Waterworks, as the Pride of the Susquehanna riverboat churns past.

The Waterworks is one of the oldest extant buildings in Harrisburg, actually comprised of four connected structures.

The original stone portion dates to 1841, built to pump water to the city’s first reservoir, which was located near the state Capitol. The pumping station was substantially enlarged in 1901, with much of the buff-colored brick structure dating to that period. In recent decades, the building fell victim both to the Tropical Storm Agnes flood of 1972, which ended its life as a pumping station, and to a devastating fire five years later.

In the 1980s, the city restored the building, turning it mostly into office space. Mann Realty acquired the property from Harrisburg in 2002 for $350,000, according to the Dauphin County property database.

Hickethier expects Andculture, a company he co-owns with partners Josh Benton and Evan Keller, to occupy the majority of the building for its main offices and for its business accelerator, Catamaran.

The company may lease out some of the remaining space, especially to complementary businesses, and would like to reserve a portion for public use, possibly for meetings and receptions, Hickethier said.

An interior view of some of the hardware inside the Old Waterworks.

Since the major city renovation 30 years ago, the building has suffered a few floods and has not undergone a major update. So, Hickethier and his partners plan to mount a complete restoration. The work includes removing drop ceilings, restoring floors, opening up spaces and making substantial repairs.

“The building has the structure and the bones: stone, steel, brick,” he said. “So, I knew we could work with it.”

Right now, they’re shooting for a year-end completion date, with the understanding that renovations could extend into 2019.

“It’s a very unique building,” Hickethier said. “There are only two on that side of Front Street, right on the river.”

The Old Waterworks is located at 614 N. Front St., Harrisburg. For more information about Andculture, visit www.andculture.com.

Capital Area Head Start limits Harrisburg enrollment as it looks for new classroom space in the city.

May 30, 2018 | by Lizzy Hardison

Capital Area Head Start provides free pre-k and daycare to hundreds of children from low-income households in Harrisburg. (Photo courtesy of CAHS.)

Capital Area Head Start is in the market for more real estate – and the sooner it finds it, the better.

The organization that provides free pre-K and daycare to almost 700 Harrisburg children will lose some of its current classroom space starting this summer, executive director Jo Pepper said on Wednesday.

The displacement has already forced CAHS to reduce its enrollment slots in Harrisburg for the 2018-19 school year. It still needs to find classroom space for 68 students before programs start on Aug. 20.

“I’m looking for what I’m calling a Band-Aid approach for next year,” Pepper said. “We need to find something now.”

Pepper was told earlier this year that the Harrisburg and Central Dauphin school districts would need to reclaim nine of the classrooms that CAHS currently uses for its programs.

She said that rising enrollments in both districts, due in part to students who migrated to the area from Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria, have increased demand for their facilities.

CAHS will continue to occupy 20 classrooms in four Harrisburg school district buildings next year, Pepper said. But finding appropriate facility space is a perennial challenge in their high-need areas, such as Allison Hill and South Harrisburg.

The ongoing hunt for facilities has forced the program to move enrollment slots out of the city and into the surrounding suburbs. Harrisburg’s current 666 enrollment spots will decline to 486 for the 2018-19 program year, according to data from CAHS.

Pepper estimated that CAHS has considered more than 100 potential locations in the city since the need for new classrooms arose. The specifications are limiting – classrooms must be on the first floor with an in-room sink, bathrooms, windows and access to outdoor play space. Any facility must be able to accommodate at least two 800-square-foot classrooms.

It’s unlikely that CAHS will find a move-in ready facility by its August deadline, Pepper said. But the need for limited renovations wouldn’t deter them from a spot in a good location.

CAHS currently runs classrooms in churches and community centers. It also uses space at Harrisburg Area Community College’s main campus at Wildwood.

Most landlords charge CAHS a nominal rent or give them the facilities for free, Pepper said. The organization does have a limited budget to pay rent in a new facility, but Pepper declined to specify a rate.

CAHS has already found one new location in Paxtonia that can accommodate 64 children. But Pepper noted that it is not in walking distance for children in Harrisburg’s high-need areas, and CAHS does not provide busing.

TheBurg reported in October that CAHS would occupy classrooms in Hamilton Health Center when it completed a planned expansion this year. The expansion would have enabled the program to redistribute 80 enrollment slots to its Allison Hill program for the 2018-19 school year.

But Pepper said on Wednesday that moving into Hamilton Health was no longer possible.

Hamilton Health officials could not be immediately reached for comment.

CAHS currently provides pre-K programs in seven school districts in Dauphin, Perry and Cumberland counties, Pepper said.

The 17104 zip code, which encompasses Allison Hill and South Harrisburg, has the highest need – and the longest waiting list — of any area served by Capital Area Head Start.

Have a lead on open facility space in Harrisburg? Contact Jo Pepper at [email protected].

Harrisburg sets second networking, certification event for minority, disadvantaged businesses

May 30, 2018 | by Yaasmeen Piper

The federal courthouse is one of the main projects coming to Harrisburg that will need workers.

Harrisburg will host its second Minority, Women, Disadvantaged Business (MWDB) Enterprise event on Friday, a networking opportunity for local companies and a way to provide resources for small businesses.

The city is holding the event along with Capital Region Water and the Keystone Contractors Association.

“We want our small businesses, particularly women, disadvantaged and minority businesses in Harrisburg to partake in the [event],” said Mayor Eric Papenfuse.

Attending vendors will include PennDOT, the state Department of General Services, Mascaro Construction and the Community First Fund, as well as local banks and certification agencies.

Highlights will include the PA Department of Transportation, which will present a panel discussion on certifications, and Community First Fund, which will hold a panel on obtaining and using credit and will discuss its new fund for businesses.

Marc Kurowski, board chairman for Capital Region Water, said his company will undertake $40 million in capital improvement projects in 2018 alone.

“[This organization] has been fully committed to providing opportunities to local minority, women and disadvantaged business enterprises in all of our local projects,” he said. “There is a lot of work that is coming out of CRW, as well as the city going forward, [with] opportunities for MWDB participation.”

Jon O’Brien, executive director of the Keystone Contractors Association, said that a strong connection between contractors, subcontractors and the market lead to a stronger city.

“It’s always good if you have firms that come in like Mascaro Construction—they’re coming to build a $200 million courthouse,” he said. “Firms like that, they want to come here, they want to work with local firms. They don’t want to rely on out-of-town firms or out-of-town workforce.”

Harrisburg currently has a long line of projects coming up, such as the building of the Harrisburg University office tower, the new state Archives and the federal courthouse.

“We’re in a situation where, over the next couple of years in Harrisburg, there are going to be so many opportunities for jobs, and we don’t want anyone to miss out,” Papenfuse said.

He added that, over the past four to five years, Harrisburg has stabilized after being on the brink of bankruptcy and is ready to welcome new business ventures and city projects.

“We’re ready for the next phase, and the next phase is empowering the community to take part and participate in the growth and economic development of the city,” he said. “We’re there for all small businesses.”

The MWDB Enterprise networking and certification event will be held this Friday, June 1, at the National Civil War Museum in Reservoir Park, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. This event is free and open to the public, but registration is available at capitalregionwater.com.

Going Up: HBG school board passes preliminary budget with maximum tax hike, staff cuts.

May 29, 2018 | by Lizzy Hardison

The Harrisburg school board at tonight’s meeting.

Harrisburg homeowners likely will pay higher school taxes this year, thanks to a preliminary budget approved by the Harrisburg school board tonight.

Board directors voted 7-2 to levy a 3.6 percent tax increase, the district’s first since 2012.

Combined with the elimination of 50½ teaching, administrative and support positions, the additional tax revenue will reduce the district’s $9 million deficit to $4.7 million for the 2018-19 school year, Business Administrator Bilal Hasan said.

At tonight’s special board meeting, no members of the public protested the proposed tax hikes. But almost a dozen said that preserving the ranks of teachers, principals and support staff should be the district’s first priority.

Kayla Mini, a music teacher at Foose Elementary School, said that cutting teachers and support staff would exacerbate the district’s poor teacher retention rate.

“Thirty students in a classroom is not kind to me, my colleagues or administrators or to kids,” Mini said. “Why do we have such a high turnover? I guarantee it is because of unkind working conditions.”

District residents offered ideas for cost-cutting measures. Jayne Buchwach proposed a 5-percent pay cut for central administration staff, and Kia Hansard pointed to administrative positions that could be eliminated to increase efficiency.

Jody Barksdale, president of the Harrisburg Education Association, said the district should bid out current services to ensure it is getting the lowest rates on procurement.

The budget that the board approved tonight will eliminate 24 instructional staff, 14.5 administrators (including four school vice principals) and 11 sanitation workers, counselors and security personnel represented by the AFSCME union.

It will also set the district’s tax rate at 28.8 mills, an increase of 1.0008 mills from this year. With Harrisburg’s median home value of $42,800, the tax hike will cost the average city homeowner an additional $43 a year.

Long-term budget projections presented in April call for tax hikes of the same magnitude every year through 2021.

The board has until June 30 to submit a final budget to the state. Until then, the district’s business office will search for more cost-cutting measures, Hasan said.

When pressed by board President Judd Pittman, Hasan said that the business office could consider some of the proposals made by district residents.

However, Hasan said that it would be up to different bargaining units to volunteer to take pay cuts. He also emphasized that all positions in the district’s central administration office were the first to be considered for elimination.

Even so, the board could add one more administrative position before the budget is finalized. It voted 7-2 tonight to approve a resolution for the creation of a new assistant superintendent position.

That position is not currently included in the 2018-19 budget, Hasan said, but will be added following the board’s affirmative vote.

Board directors Carrie Fowler and Tyrell Spradley voted against the assistant superintendent motion. Fowler also dissented in the 7-2 budget vote, joined by board director Percel Eiland.

Who Was Chosen? Harrisburg proposes recipients for federal housing funds.

May 29, 2018 | by Lawrance Binda

Members of Harrisburg City Council listen as a resident speaks at tonight’s meeting.

The annual process of disbursing federal housing funds began tonight, as Harrisburg City Council introduced an ordinance that would provide money to nearly a dozen nonprofit groups.

Mayor Eric Papenfuse said that the city used the same process in selecting award recipients as last year, using a point-based merit system to judge applications.

“It’s a number of small grants,” Papenfuse said. “It’s not as much as anyone wanted.”

In all, the city will distribute $2.04 million in Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) money, a program of the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development. This amount includes almost $1.9 million from the 2018 allocation, plus a small supplemental amount tied to unallocated funds from a prior year.

Like last year, the greatest single amount of money, $593,423, will go to repay federal loans the city backed during the Reed administration for several development projects, including the disastrous Capitol View Commerce Center project, which went bankrupt before being completed years later by a new owner.

“If we didn’t have an exorbitant debt service, we’d have a lot more money for housing,” Papenfuse said.

Most of the nonprofits proposed to receive funds have gotten some money from previous CDBG allocations. The proposed recipients include:

TriCounty HDC: $250,000
Habitat for Humanity: $100,000
A Miracle 4 Sure: $50,000
TLC Work Based Training: $45,000
Christian Recovery Aftercare Ministries (C.R.A.M.): $40,000
Latino Hispanic Community Center: $25,000
Heinz-Menaker Senior Center: $25,000
Fair Housing Council: $25,000
PPL/IN HOUSE: $20,000
Shades of Greatness: $15,000
Neighborhood Dispute Settlement: $5,000

Like last year, Tina Nixon, an executive with UPMC Pinnacle, scored the applications, Papenfuse said. While most nonprofits that applied received some funding, several did not make the cut, he said.

In addition, the city is proposing to allocate $321,642 for its housing rehabilitation programs and another $408,765 to CDBG administration.

At tonight’s meeting, Les Ford, executive director of Heinz-Menaker, addressed council to emphasize the importance of the Midtown Harrisburg facility.

“The Heinz-Menaker Senior Center is the most active senior center in Dauphin County, bar none,” he said. “We’re just lucky enough to have that in the city of Harrisburg.”

Last year, the administration did not recommend that Heinz-Menaker receive CDBG funds, saying its application did not make the cut. In the end, council reversed that decision and approved $25,000 for the center.

Council is slated to discuss CDBG funding at its next work session, scheduled for June 5. In recent years, it has made some adjustments to the administration’s proposal.

Bears to Caps: Hershey fans will see familiar faces during Stanley Cup final.

May 29, 2018 | by Erica Koup

The Stanley Cup finals are underway this week—16 teams entered and two are left. The Washington Capitals are facing off against the Vegas Golden Knights.

One of the teams has a special connection to the central Pennsylvania region. If you have ever been to a Hershey Bears game, you might see some familiar faces on the ice for the Capitals during the final series. Since the 2005-06 season, the AHL’s Hershey Bears has been the primary development club for the NHL’s Washington Capitals.

Hershey has developed players like Braden Holtby, Philipp Grubauer, Dmitry Orlov, Nathan Walker and Chandler Stephenson, all former Bears players. These former Bears will play a key role in this series, in an attempt to secure Washington’s first Stanley Cup.

Hershey has been ingrained in hockey history and is the longest continuously operating member club still playing in its original city. The history of Hershey hockey goes way back to 1931 with amateur matches between college teams. Milton S. Hershey saw the popularity of these games, which encouraged him to bring a professional hockey team permanently to Hershey. Gordie Howe, known as “Mr. Hockey” and 1972 Hockey Hall of Fame inductee, even once remarked that, “Everybody who is anybody in hockey has played in Hershey.” It was a high compliment from the hockey icon.

This year’s Stanley Cup match up will be compelling as both teams have great storylines.

The Caps are known as a hard-luck squad that, while typically one of the best teams in the league, can’t close the deal once they hit the playoffs. Meanwhile, the Golden Knights are a first-year expansion team out of Sin City. Made up of leftover players from the other 30 squads, the team is making history for having the best first-year ever for any professional expansion team.

The Caps’ captain, Alex Ovechkin, is electric and the best goal scorer of his time. He is facing Marc-Andre Fleury in net, who is looking to continue his great playoff run. Fleury is a veteran to postseason hockey, winning the Stanley Cup three times with the Pittsburgh Penguins.

Someone is going to win their first Stanley Cup. Will it be the Washington Capitals or the newcomers, Vegas Golden Knights?

If you have not been watching the Stanley Cup playoffs so far, it is time now to tune in for some of the best competition of the 2017-18 sports season. Hockey not your thing? Vegas does not disappoint during the pregame show, starting every home game with a cosplaying Knight dueling a mascot from the other team, faux-stabbing that mascot, then “vanquishing” him and lifting him up into the rafters. Let’s hope these two teams take it to game seven, which means we won’t have our Stanley Cup champ until June 13.

The Stanley Cup finals began Monday night, with the Vegas Golden Knights taking a 1-0 series lead with an exciting, high-scoring 6-4 victory. The series continues on Wednesday at 8 p.m.

“Markets Have Collapsed”: Cities, waste companies ponder next steps as the recycling industry faces crisis.

May 25, 2018 | by Lizzy Hardison

Penn Waste employees sort recycled material at the company’s Materials Recovery Facility in York County. Processing costs at the MRF are causing Penn Waste to lose $800,000 a month on its recycling program, since the export market for recycled goods has collapsed. (Photo courtesy of Penn Waste.)

If you tossed paper or plastic in a blue recycling bin this year, there’s a good chance it won’t find its second life anytime soon.

The global supply chain that takes waste from households in the United States to processing plants in China has broken, industry leaders say, leaving months’ worth of recyclable material sitting in American warehouses without a prospective destination.

“The industry is in crisis,” said James Warner, CEO of Lancaster County Solid Waste Management Authority (LCSWMA). “The economics of recycling are underwater.”

Pennsylvania waste companies, including the York County-based Penn Waste, which collects and processes recyclable waste in Harrisburg and most of south central Pennsylvania, are seeking temporary relief from a state law that prohibits the disposal of recyclable materials as trash.

The Department of Environmental Protection enforces that law but does not have the authority to grant exemptions from it, according to an agency spokesperson.

As a result, recycling firms are accumulating hundreds of tons of recyclable material that they cannot sell.

“We cannot get it out the door quick enough,” said Penn Waste spokesperson Amanda Davison. “We’ve already slowed down processing and we’re adding more equipment and labor… but the markets have collapsed.”

Davidson said the material at Penn Waste’s facility in York County is getting even less marketable as time goes on, since “it can only sit outside for so long before it becomes a safety hazard because of rain deterioration and vermin.”

Penn Waste, which was founded by Republican gubernatorial candidate Scott Wagner, has lost $800,000 a month since October on its recycling business, Davidson said. The company reported $75 million in revenue in 2017, according to the Central Penn Business Journal.

To make up for the loss, Penn Waste has imposed a sustainability fee on its commercial accounts and plans to ask municipalities to renegotiate their rates in their contracts.

Both Davidson and Warner say that the sudden breakdown of the global recycling market could reshape the industry for good, potentially changing the way that municipalities collect recyclables and pass costs on to consumers.

A Problem with Global Reach
For decades, China has been the largest global importer of recycled goods. The country consumed more than 50 percent of the world’s recycled paper and plastic in 2016, according to the National Waste and Recycling Association.

As Chinese demand for recycled goods grew in the 1990s and 2000s, American recycling programs flourished. Revenues from selling recycled waste always exceeded the cost of transporting, processing and packaging it, Warner said, which allowed municipalities, including Harrisburg, to haul away residents’ recyclables without charging them.

But the economic equation that supports that model has deteriorated in the past year. The very systems that allowed haulers to collect more recyclables also harmed the quality of their exports over time.

Single-stream recycling programs, for instance, which allow consumers to toss all of their recyclables into the same collection bin, proliferated in the 2000s. They allowed haulers to collect more recyclable waste than ever before, but it was also contaminated with growing amounts of food waste, non-recyclable plastics and medical waste.

“The U.S. got very sloppy,” Warner said. “We made it too convenient and didn’t educate consumers enough about what was and wasn’t recyclable.”

Chinese importers warned American firms in 2013 that they needed better quality control. But American contamination levels continued to rise, reaching an all-time high of 20 percent last year. At that rate, one in five items in a processed bale of recycling is non-recyclable trash.

China’s latest response came in November, when it announced that it would not accept any material with a contamination level above .5 percent starting in 2018. The decree has disqualified almost all of America’s recycled waste from import.

With the Chinese market suddenly inaccessible, haulers like Penn Waste have begun to seek out other Asian and domestic markets to sell the recyclables that they sort and bale at their plant in York County.

But the few substitute markets that do exist are already saturated by larger firms, such as Dallas-based Waste Management, the largest sanitation company in the world.

“Smaller, regional [companies] can’t compete because they have such a small volume,” said LCSWMA spokesperson Kathryn Sandoe. “Waste Management might be able to sell the material at such a low rate because they have to move it, but then a company like Penn Waste has nowhere to move theirs.”

The New Cost of Business
Sooner or later, the chaos racking the recycling industry will bring a cost to consumers.

Davidson and Warner warned that the era of “free recycling” will come to an end and haulers may have to move away from single-stream collection programs.

LCSWMA, which manages waste material brought collected by private haulers, used to sell recyclable materials to Penn Waste for $4 per ton. Now, they’re paying Penn Waste $40 per ton to take the waste off their hands.

Warner said that the loss of recycling markets won’t eat into the authority’s $85 million annual revenues. Penn Waste is absorbing most of the costs now, since it owns the Materials Recovery Facility (MRF) that sorts and bales recyclables for export.

Davidson said that Penn Waste may have to move to a fee-based model for processing recycling, which would spread cost out over collectors and residential and commercial customers.

Penn Waste is bound by contracts with its municipal account holders, which usually last for terms of three to five years, Davidson said. If they don’t renegotiate rates now, municipalities will see them skyrocket to retroactively compensate Penn Waste for the revenue it lost on their accounts.

Harrisburg may be the only exception. The city’s $190 per-ton dumping fee at LCSWMA is double what the rest of Dauphin County pays, due to terms of a financial restructuring deal in which Harrisburg sold the incinerator to the waste authority.

As a result, it’s unlikely that the cost of recycling will ever eclipse the cost of dumping Harrisburg’s trash at the incinerator.

“One of benefits, if you can call it that, of having such high tipping fees is that we can incentivize people to recycle as much as possible because it’s better for the city financially,” said Harrisburg Mayor Eric Papenfuse. “But in [a township] with reasonable tipping fees, it may not make sense to pay exorbitant recycling costs to Penn Waste.”

Papenfuse said Harrisburg residents should take as much recycling out of the waste stream as they can. But according to Warner, that emphasis on diversion is what led to the current crisis in the American recycling industry.

“It’s not grounded in reality,” Warner said. “Communities are preaching diversion, and the only thing they’re getting is more trash in the recycling bin, which is hurting recycling.”

He and Davidson said that consumer education will be key to repairing the industry. Warner said that many consumers believe that all plastics are recyclable, even though disposable shopping bags, food packaging and food containers are considered contaminants.

Warner also said that single-stream recycling may be replaced by dual-stream programs that allow processors to extract valuable materials more easily. Papenfuse said that Harrisburg could consider dual-stream recycling if the convenience of single-stream becomes cost-prohibitive.

Watch a tour of Penn Waste’s Materials Recovery Facility to learn how recyclables are sorted, baled and prepared for export. Also, see this guide from LCSWMA to learn what is and isn’t recyclable. In Harrisburg, glass must be recycled in designated collection bins located throughout the city.

Weekend Roundup with Sara Bozich

May 24, 2018 | by Sara Bozich

Happy Long Weekend!

(Psst, today is my husband’s birthday. Say hi, or listen to his podcast. Tweet him.) The first of the summer holiday is upon us, but man, it looks kinda gross. We have minimal plans, which is great because maybe I will finally get my garden in today/tomorrow, and maybe we’ll take the kiddo to Artsfest, but definitely to the Market.

What are you doing this weekend?

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Superintendents to State: We need more funding to support our students.

May 23, 2018 | by Yaasmeen Piper

Superintendents from a number of urban school districts in Pennsylvania gathered on Tuesday inside the state Capitol to ask for additional funding.

A group of Pennsylvania superintendents, students and parents rallied inside the state Capitol for increased school funding on Tuesday, saying that, due to a lack of resources, vital programs and staff were being cut.

“We as superintendents of urban school districts came to Harrisburg today to speak with our legislature about what it is that they can do and what we can do to help them improve the lives of our young students,” said Dr. Juan Baughn, superintendent of Chester Upland school district.

Dr. Stephen Butz, superintendent of the Southeast Delco school district, told the story of a student named Brittany and her journey through the district. Butz first met Brittney a decade ago when she was in kindergarten. While Brittney struggled with reading, she enjoyed the music program that was then offered to kindergarten students.

“She was singing in the chorus that year,” Butz said. “I remember her mom– her mom was working two jobs that year just to make ends meet, but she was concerned about Brittney, concerned that Brittney get a good education.”

By the time Brittney was in fourth grade, the music program and a physical education program had been cut, the average class size had risen from 25 to 33 students, and, by Brittney’s second year of high school, the district’s staff of more 700 had been slashed to fewer than 600.

“Brittney is now a 16- or 17-year-old student looking ahead toward college, looking ahead toward being successful, and that’s what state funding [toward] education can provide,” Butz said. “We must adequately fund our schools for our students. All of our students.”

About eight years ago, the Harrisburg school district faced a $22 million deficit, closing five schools and furloughing hundreds of employees. According to Superintendent Sybil Knight-Burney, that was just the beginning.

As a new superintendent, Knight-Burney said she was forced to eliminate music, athletics, pre-K and kindergarten programs. Now, Harrisburg is in danger of losing of kindergarten completely.

“No new superintendent should have to tell her community that their neediest and most vulnerable student population would be at risk for failure because there will be no pre-K or kindergarten program to provide them with the fundamental tools needed to learn just [how] to read,” she said.

According to Knight-Burney, the lack of funding is a vicious cycle. It leads to a reduced quality of education, which contributes to parents taking their children out of the district.

“Families and businesses that have the ability to relocate often choose to do that and move to the more affluent districts, contributing to the upward spiral of real estate values there and the downward spiral that often occurs in the urban or otherwise economically disadvantaged areas,” she said.

Knight-Burney estimated that the Harrisburg district is underfunded each year by more than $35 million.

“I’m often asked, and I struggle to try and understand, ‘Why is it that our lawmakers don’t want our students in our urban districts to receive a fair and equitable education?’” she said. “I am still struggling, as my colleagues are struggling, to understand why this inequity is allowed to continue to the eventual detriment of our greatest commodity, our children.”

Several speakers at the event strongly denounced Senate Bill 2, which would allow students who live in the state’s lowest academically performing districts to use public money for private school tuition.

Alan Johnson, superintendent of the Woodland Hills school district, said his school would suffer under the proposed law, which would divert tax money away from public schools to private entities.

“We don’t just educate,” Johnson said. “We clothe our children, we feed our children, we care for them after school, sometimes we care for them on weekends. We see to their physical health, we see to their mental health, we see to their behavioral health. We do so much more than educate.”

Despite inadequate funding, Johnson said his school still holds an 88-percent graduation rate, with 60 percent of students going on to a two- or four-year college. He and other superintendents criticized wording from some school voucher proponents, who have described lower-performing public school districts as “failing.”

“And out of this building [the Capitol] came a system that says my school district is failing,” he said. “I don’t think the school district is failing. I think the system is failing our school districts.”

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