Port Authority OKs $6M Bond Sale to Assist West Warren Project
VIENNA TOWNSHIP, Ohio – The Western Reserve Port Authority Board of Directors authorized selling up to $6 million in taxable development lease revenue bonds to support the new West Warren Industrial Park in Warren.
A July groundbreaking is anticipated for the 98,280-square-foot structure that will be the first building at the industrial park, Mike Martof said at the meeting. Martof is a managing partner of Sapientia Ventures LLC, which announced plans for the park in February 2023.
During its monthly meeting Wednesday morning, which was held at the Avalon at Squaw Creek Country Club, members of the port authority board approved issuing the bonds and executing final documents in connection with a capital lease with West Warren Property 1 LLC.
“We’re hopefully going to be breaking ground – actual dirt moving – in July,” Martof said. The state Controlling Board approved a $4 million Rural Industrial Park Loan at its meeting Monday, and JobsOhio is considering additional funds to assist the project, he said.
The port authority previously had assisted Sapientia Ventures, a local venture capital group that also owns The Business Journal, with assembling property for the proposed industrial park.
West Warren will repay the funds loaned from the proceeds of the bond sales over five years, said Anthony Trevena, WRPA’s executive director.
In other business, the port authority board approved the sale of two of the properties it acquired from Steward Health Care last year. One sale was to Alan Merkin for property surrounding Allen’s PharmaServ, 510 Gypsy Lane, Youngstown, for $10,000. The other was a $35,000 sale of a building at 4321 Mahoning Ave. to Higgins-Reardon Funeral Home, which is adjacent to the building.
“The Reardon funeral home folks have been taking care of this parcel for some time,” Trevena said. The building likely will require demolition.
The two properties were among 26 parcels that the port authority purchased for $300,000 from Steward Health, which operates Trumbull Regional Medical Center in Warren, Hillside Rehabilitation Hospital in Howland Township, Sharon Regional Medical Center in Sharon, Pa., and other medical facilities in other states.
Pictured at top: A rendering of the first building that will be built at the West Warren Industrial Park.
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