Penn State Altoona plans to acquire and rehabilitate the former Meyer Jonasson building on 11th Street as the first permanent home of its entrepreneurial program - extending a decade-long downtown investment while helping solve a space problem on its Ivyside campus.
The long-rumored $1.8 million-plus project includes acquisition of the former Kaufman's Wedding World lot next door, where the college will build a small park and parking spaces.
If it obtains funding, the college could build on that lot. Chancellor Lori Bechtel-Wherry envisions the possibility of a three-story building that could house something like the proposed Rail Transit Engineering program.
A $2.5 million gift to the college from Steve and Nancy Sheetz announced in August is making the Entrepreneurial Center project possible, Bechtel-Wherry said.
That gift expressed Steve Sheetz's passion for entrepreneurship and his belief in the benefits of challenging students to pursue their ambitions, take risks and innovate, she said at the time.
The 5-year-old entrepreneurship option for business students has moved from the Devorris Center for Business Development to miscellaneous space on campus.
The entrepreneurial program will be a perfect fit downtown, the original business heart of the city, Bechtel-Wherry said.
The new location will give students "a place to develop their business ideas and concepts, to counsel small business owners and interact with local business leaders," said Donna Bon, an entrepreneurship instructor, in a news release.
Because of its inexpensive rents and plenty of vacancies, downtown has long served as a de facto business incubator, city officials have said.
The Blair County General Authority on Friday bought the properties on the college's behalf for $614,900.
The college will enter a 15-year lease-to-purchase agreement with tax-exempt interest.
The college will own them when it pays off the mortgage - which it can do at any time, according to Patrick Miller, deputy director of Altoona Blair County Development Corp., which helped put the deal together, along with the city, the Greater Altoona Economic Development Corp. and First National Bank.
The bank owned the Wedding World property, while the Brett family owned the Meyer Jonasson building.
The renovation will cost at least $1 million, while the small park and parking lot will cost a "couple hundred thousand," Bechtel-Wherry guessed.
The project should take a year to a year-and-a-half, college spokeswoman Shari Routch said.
The deal for the Entrepreneurial Center is like those for the college's first two acquisitions downtown - the former Playhouse Theater, now the Devorris Downtown Center; and the five-story section of the former Penn Furniture building, known as the Aaron Building.
The college has also acquired the former WRTA building, now the Kazmaier Family Building.
Placing classrooms and offices of programs that fit downtown is advantageous all around - to the college, its students, the city and the property owners who sell out, according to Bechtel-Wherry and ABCD President and CEO Martin J. Marasco.
It frees premium space at Ivyside and helps redevelop the long-struggling center city, which helps repay the city for support that has allowed the college to survive and prosper for 70 years, Bechtel-Wherry said.
The college has no definite long-term building plans yet for the Wedding World property.
The college would probably need about $15 million for the three-story building she envisions, Bechtel-Wherry said. She said she would need to raise the money from donors.
She hopes to raise money from the railroad industry this summer for the Railroad and Transit Engineering program.
Downtown's main "drivers" for development now are "meds and eds," with Penn State Altoona and Station Medical Center creating conditions for complementary development, Marasco said.
The vision has been in place a long time, but now the "stars are aligned," with the right people in the right places to make it happen, Bechtel-Wherry said.
