Commerce Bank Employees to Suds Up For a Good Cause
On Saturday, September 29, employees from local Commerce Bank offices will be washing cars, with proceeds benefiting the Central PA Chapter of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.

Multiple Sclerosis (MS) is a chronic, often disabling disease of the central nervous system. Over 4,200 people live with MS in Central PA alone.

The car wash will be held from 9 a.m. to noon in the parking lot of the Commerce Bank, Mountain Road Branch, located at 6701 Allentown Boulevard in Harrisburg.

For more information on the car wash or MS, call 652-2108.

$675,000 Grant Awarded to Penn State Harrisburg Campus
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency recently awarded a $675,000 grant to the environmental engineering programs of Penn State Harrisburg.

The funding furthers the EPA support of the Small Public Water Systems Technology Assistance Center on the Penn State Harrisburg campus. Housed in the Science and Technology Building, the Center is one of five national facilities created as a result of 1999’s Safe Drinking Water Amendments. The Amendments “focused attention on enhancing the technical, financial, and managerial capacity of public water systems to consistently comply with national drinking water regulations.”

The amended act authorized the EPA to make grants to institutions of higher learning to establish and operate small public water system technology assistance centers. The five centers are to serve as national models, providing the federal government with help in developing and implementing programs.

Second Kids Café to Open
America’s Second Harvest and ConAgra have joined forces with the Central Pennsylvania Food Bank to open the region’s second Kids Café. The Café, located in Harrisburg’s Salvation Army, provides “nutritious meal in a nurturing environment to youth who may not otherwise receive an evening meal.”

Beyond meals, the Café will also provide tutoring sessions, nutrition education, and guidance from volunteer mentors.

The Kids Café will operate every day throughout the school year.

World Runners Tend Local Bar to Help ADA
On Thursday, September 20, Shady McGrady’s will be continuing their “Guest Bartender Night” program, a series of fundraising events benefiting various charities. Behind the bar this time will be Amy Mason and Angela Shade, two locals who will be running an international marathon with the other 10,000 runners of Team Diabetes.

Mason, from Hershey, and Shade, from Lancaster, will be heading to Ireland in October to run an annual 26.2-mile marathon. Before the jog, however, Mason and Shade will take over Shady’s taps from 7 p.m.–9 p.m. to raise money for the local American Diabetes Association chapter. Aiming for just over $8,000, all tips the women earn from their shift will go toward the ADA.

CREDC Assists With Funding for Local Industry;
52 New Jobs to be Created
The Capital Region Economic Development Corporation (CREDC) recently announced that it has finished the financial package for FDA Packaging, Inc. A provider of secondary co-packaging and collating shipper’s displays, FDA Packaging closed their $610,000 Pennsylvania Industrial Development Authority (PIDA) loan on August 23. The funds will assist with the acquisition and renovation of the property, located at 2715 North Seventh Street in Harrisburg. In addition to the PIDA funds, FDA also received $200,000 through the Small Business First (SBF) loan program and was approved for a $200,000 Community Economic Development (CED) loan.

The funds will create 52 new jobs and retain 65 existing positions.

The economic development arm of the Harrisburg Regional Chamber, CREDC is a regional economic organization intended to provide assistance to virtually any size or type of business by offering services in existing business retention and expansion, new business recruitment and development, and community improvement and development.

Holy Spirit Hospital Breaks Ground
for Area’s Newest Heart Center
On September 5, Holy Spirit Hospital in Camp Hill broke ground on what is to be the region’s newest heart center. A four-story, 14,000-square-foot facility, the Heart Center at Holy Spirit is slated to open as early as 2003.

The Heart Center will round out the hospital’s coverage. With a strong foundation in laparoscopic and peripheral vascular surgery already in place, the Center will “step up the level of service to meet the changing needs of the aging population.”

“It would be irresponsible for Holy Spirit not to meet the needs of our community,” said Niles S. Been, chairman of Holy Spirit Health System’s board of directors. “Over the next ten years, the largest segment of our population will be 45 years or older. Heart disease and related problems are the number one killer of people in this age group. The Heart Center at Holy Spirit will provide a much-needed service, not only for residents of Camp Hill and the West Shore area, but for those who live in the greater Harrisburg area and throughout southcentral Pennsylvania. It will make Holy Spirit Hospital a full-service hospital.”

Upon its opening, the Heart Center will have four operating rooms, three catheterization labs, one electrophysiology lab and 30 beds. Holy Spirit will expand its cardiac catheterization capabilities and vascular surgical services by offering therapeutic catheterizations, including balloon angioplasty and stenting, and open heart surgery.

“The Heart Center at Holy Spirit will team many of the region’s most respected physicians with the region’s newest heart center,” said Sister Romaine Niemeyer, president and CEO of Holy Spirit Health System. “It will be a pleasure to have many skilled physicians and specialists work in a facility that truly will be state of the art. Our patients deserve nothing less.”