Supervisor Mazzoni loves libraries and they love him back

Bruce Mazzoni, who has served on Cranberry’s Board of Supervisors for the last three years, was just named “Public Official of the Year” by a statewide library organization in Harrisburg. It caught him by surprise – the result of a hush-hush nomination by the Cranberry Library’s board. Bruce is a long-time resident of our community who, along with his wife Conni, used to regularly bring their now-grown daughters to the library. That eventually led to an invitation to join the Library’s board, which, in turn, marked the start of Bruce’s amazing public service to the Township and ultimately to his election as a Township Supervisor. Although he had to step down from the Library board upon becoming a Supervisor, his support for the Library continued in a number of important ways, which included work with the County library board, advocacy for library projects, and his own personal generosity. So the recent award was a well-deserved honor. And it has been an honor for me and for everyone else on the Township’s staff to work with a Board made up of people who are so incredibly committed to the quality of life of our community. Way to go, Bruce!

Cranberry’s stepping into the world of social media

What’s the best way to reach you? That’s a question our Board and a lot of our staff members have been asking. And the answer seems to depend on two things. One is the type of information – for instance, an announcement for an upcoming concert may be handled differently than an alert about a road closure. The other factor is the personal media preference of each individual; some people are big on text messaging, some people hate it. And so on. So we did a survey earlier this year and determined that we needed to use a mix of different media to reach people. As a result, in addition to our more established channels – the website, CranberryToday, news releases, and email – we’ve gotten into social media, including this blog. We’ve got a presence now on Facebook. We’re on Twitter. And we’re using a new Twitter-like service called Nixle, which is reserved for urgent and emergency-type announcements. You can sign on for any of these from our home page. They’re all free. And we hope they will help us stay in touch.

When do you call 911?

by Lt. Kevin Meyer, Cranberry Police Department

Everyone knows that 911 is the number to call for an emergency response, anywhere in the country. So if you have a serious situation – a fire, a wreck, a burglary, or so on – that’s who you call and that’s the number you teach your kids to call. But what if it’s not really an emergency? What if it’s a request for some other service, like getting a cat down from a tree, or help getting into your locked car, or your dog ran away, or someone’s blocking your driveway? What then? That’s a 911 call, too. The only time you would use the Cranberry Police Department’s administrative phone number, 724-776-5180, ext. 5, is to request a copy of a police report. For everything else, call 911. Why? So they can be documented to make sure no calls are overlooked.

Cranberry Woods sale confirms the value of planning

Late last month, the entire Cranberry Woods Business Park complex, except for its Westinghouse, MSA and Regional Learning Alliance campuses, was sold to a Pittsburgh-based investment group. Altogether, it included 460,000 square feet of office space, and it sold for $89.5 million. If you do the math, that’s a little more than $185 per square foot. But, according to the Pittsburgh Business Times, the average price per square foot for suburban Class A office space in western Pennsylvania today is just $90, and in downtown Pittsburgh it’s $67. That’s a huge difference, and it didn’t simply happen. Way back in the early ‘90s, our Board of Supervisors worked with MSA on creating the vision for a world-class business park capable of competing with the Carolinas for knowledge-based industries. It became part of our 1995 comprehensive plan. And over the following years, we worked hard to implement that plan. I think it’s fair to say that the recent sale of Cranberry Woods validates the merit of formulating a vision and following it through.

What’s the deal with Cranberry’s Internet/Video service providers?

A lot of people want to know: when is Cranberry going to get more TV/Internet services? And why are we stopping this or that service from being offered in the Township? The fact is, Cranberry has been actively recruiting video and Internet Service Providers, or ISPs, to provide their services here. It’s purely a business decision by each provider. Local governments have to approve the use of public rights-of-way to install lines and vaults, and we’ve done so with both Armstrong and Consolidated Communications. We’ve also invited Verizon and Embarq to offer those services as well. And while we haven’t heard back yet, we anticipate that they will begin offering them sometime in the foreseeable future. The bottom line is that the Township is poised to help all the ISPs offer their services to Cranberry customers on the same footing. It gets complicated, but if you have any questions, give me a call: 724-776-4806.