Tyrone Borough is about to embark on something it hasn’t done in more than 30 years.
The borough beat a mid-April deadline to apply for funding through the state to pay for half of the costs for a new comprehensive plan. The move will allow the borough to update the last plan which was done in 1974. The borough had been advised most such plans are good for only about a 10-year-period.
Last week, Tyrone got word it was approved for $20,100 from a Department of Community and Economic Development grant program to help fund the effort on the comprehensive plan. The borough will put up $18,900 in matching funds from the planning and zoning part of its budget.
Interim Borough Manager Sharon Dannaway said she and Mayor Patricia Stoner signed the necessary documents with DCED for the grant money and have entered into an agreement with an engineering and design firm to do the work on the comprehensive plan.
Dannaway explained with the expected opening of Interstate 99, connecting Altoona and State College, it was important for Tyrone to have a new plan in place.
She said the comprehensive plan will evaluate housing stock, infrastructure, demographics, education facilities as well as parks and recreation.
Dannaway said once I-99 opens up such a plan would be “critical” so Tyrone “can be ready for the influx of people relocating here.” She noted the plan would include information from a comprehensive plan being under taken by Snyder Township along with one which is being done for all of Blair County.
Dannaway added the plan would also look to update a 1983 zoning ordinance.
In a previous Daily Herald article Dannaway said Altoona-based The EADS Group would be in charge of doing the project for the borough.
“They go out into the community and assess what we have now, they’ll look at what we did have and look toward the future,” said Dannaway.
Dannaway said their would also be public input to shape the plan.
“Through these meetings with the public and the research they’ll do, they’ll put together this comprehensive plan,” said Dannaway. “(It’s done) to say this has been the past history of the borough from the beginning, this is what’s happened, this where we are at now and according to the census information, this is what we may need to look at in the future to plan for projects.”
Under the agreement with The EADS Group, work on the plan can commence as soon as July 1 and is expected to take about two years to be completed.
