- The site of the former Sebring Royal China Company has contaminated soil. It’s been an eyesore for decades.
- State and local authorities announced on Monday that cleanup efforts will begin this summer after soil testing.
- Property owner Mike Conny said he hopes to start redeveloping the 20-acre site within three years.
SEBRING – State and local authorities expect the former Royal China property to be cleaned up and redeveloped within a few years.
“It’s real. It’s happening,” said Debora Flora, executive director of Mahoning County Land Bank. “It will continue until its completion.”
Flora and other officials, including Sebring Mayor James Harp, celebrated a project milestone on Monday with a press conference at the Village Fire Department substation across from the 20-meter brownfield site. acres.
Officials said funding for the $1.8 million cleanup project on South 15th Street had been secured and scoping tests to identify specific areas of lead-contaminated soil to be removed or covered began this week. .
Jim Smith, president of the Brownfield Restoration Group in Akron, said the process would take at least a year, but he expected crews to start cleaning up and hauling soil to landfills by mid-summer. .
He also said the removal of this soil will pose no health risk to residents.
The former site of the Royal Sebring China Company has been a sleeping eyesore for decades. There have been four fires, including a fire in 2010 that led to the demolition of the factory building, in its history.
Flora and Harp said an attempt to clean up the site in 2008 failed due to a lack of funding.
But, in 2020, Mike Conny, the owner of MAC Trailer and several other real estate properties in the area, bought the property, which breathed new life into the project. Harp said Conny “stepped up” for the village.
“The property is in good hands with Mr. Conny,” said Flora.
Conny has expectations for the property, but no specific plans.
He said he wanted the site to be used for industrial purposes with high-paying jobs. He also said he hopes to start developing the property within three years.
“The revitalization and redevelopment of this site is progress. It’s positive,” Harp said.
Others at Monday’s event included Mahoning County Commissioner David Ditzler, Mahoning County Treasurer Dan Yemma, Sebring Fire Chief Mike Springer, State Representative Lauren McNally and State Senator Michael A. Rulli.
“This project has been on our radar for a long time,” said Yemma, chairman of Land Bank. “I’ve been sitting there in bad shape for 50 years.”
A $1.5 million state brownfields grant, guaranteed by the Land Bank, will pay for most of the project. Conny and county commissioners provided the local game with $231,000.
“It’s projects like this, not just in Sebring but especially in Youngstown and Warren proper, you see a lot of these sites right off the freeway and that would be idealistic (for business),” said Rulli said. “Without cleaning up these sites, that’s not going to happen. So it’s such a privilege to be here today.”
Once the cleanup is complete, Smith’s group will write an “additional no-action letter” confirming the remediation to the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency for final approval, and then the site can be used.
Contact Benjamin Duer at 330-580-8567 or ben.duer@cantonrep.com. On Twitter: BDuerREP.
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