Rebecca Delinger Named Capital Solutions Group Manager

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We’re pleased to announce that Rebecca Denlinger has joined HRG as Capital Solutions Group Manager, helping clients with long-range budgeting, capital planning, and funding strategies.  As a leader of our Capital Solutions team, Rebecca will be responsible for managing project workload and budgets to ensure proper resource allocation and superior project delivery.  She will also coach team members, helping them grow their skills and advance their career path.

Rebecca has over 30 years of experience in municipal management, strategic planning, public-sector finance, and economic development. She excels at communication, consensus-building, and developing practical solutions to complex community challenges. Much of her career has been dedicated to serving communities throughout Lancaster County and the surrounding region, giving her a deep understanding of the evolving landscape of local government. She understands the nuances of local decision-making, the importance of building consensus, and the financial realities facing communities. Her career in the public, private, and non-profit sectors, reflects a strong commitment to responsible stewardship of public resources and serving the best interest of the communities she works with.

Working with Rebecca, you will find that she brings an approachable, collaborative leadership style and is open to new ideas. She values different perspectives and believes in respectful communication. She’s an optimist who believes in celebrating every win: not just the ribbon-cutting but a productive meeting or incremental action that helps to move a project forward.  She always has an eye on the future but recognizes the value of each step along the way.

Adrienne Vicari and Staci Hartz Honored at Women of Influence Ceremony

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Earlier this week, we had the opportunity to attend the Central Penn Business Journal’s Women of Influence ceremony and celebrate an impressive group of accomplished and community-minded women from across the region.  They were chosen among more than 130 nominations because of their professional achievements, community involvement, and inspiring nature. We’re in awe of all of them but especially happy to see three in particular receive this recognition: Adrienne Vicari, Staci Hartz, and Mary Wagner Fox, all members of HRG’s extended family.

 

Staci Hartz, Chris Hartz, Ed Ellinger, Josh Fox, Mary Fox, Adrienne Vicari, and Pat Dennis celebrate at the Central Penn Business Journal Women of Influence award dinner.

(L-R) Staci Hartz, Chris Hartz, Ed Ellinger, Josh Fox, Mary Fox, Adrienne Vicari, and Pat Dennis

 

Staci is an engineer in our water and wastewater group who designs water distribution systems. She is also the group’s leading expert on hydraulic modeling and closely monitors drinking water regulation to advise her colleagues on impacts to our clients. Her empathy and strong communication skills make her a go-to source for information and fuel her passion for community service with her church, local food bank, and various tree planting events. She was honored as a Woman to Watch.

Adrienne is the practice area leader of our Strategic Management & Capital Solutions group and an innovative thinker whose work has received local, state, and national awards.  She is also chair of the board of directors for Girl Scouts in the Heart of Pennsylvania and actively involved in the Pennsylvania Municipal Authorities Association Women Innovation Networking Group, two groups that give her the opportunity to support and mentor women of all ages.

Mary is the first female executive director of the Pennsylvania State Ethics Commission and wife of our water & wastewater group manager, Josh Fox.  She investigates violations of the State Ethics Act and educates local governments on how to comply with the act.  She previously served as the assistant chief counsel for the state Department of General Services, the state Office of Inspector General and the state Ethics Commission, but she is particularly proud of her work implementing PA’s Small, Small Diverse, and Veteran Business programs.

Both Adrienne and Mary were honored as Women of Influence.

Please join us in congratulating Adrienne, Staci, Mary, and all of this year’s honorees.

HRG Helps Clients Obtain $12M+ in 1st Round of Local Share Account Statewide Grant Awards

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The Commonwealth Financing Authority (CFA) announced their first round of grant awards for the Local Share Account – Statewide program last week, including more than $12.9 million for HRG’s clients!

We helped 27 municipalities and municipal authorities successfully apply for funding for a wide variety of projects, including parks, wastewater treatment plant improvements, equipment purchases, water and sewer line rehabilitation, flood mitigation, and downtown revitalization. We’re proud to be helping these important projects move forward.

The CFA also announced funding awards for the Multimodal Transportation Fund, and two of our clients received funding for streetscape and revitalization projects.  The CFA Multimodal Transportation Fund is designed to promote economic development and safety through transportation enhancements. Eligible projects include streetscapes, lighting, sidewalks, and transit-oriented development.  If you have projects like this in mind, reach out to us! The new funding round just opened with a deadline of July 31st, and we’d love to help you develop a grant application strategy for your community’s needs.

Lauren Zumbrun Promoted to Group Manager

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Lauren Zumbrun has been promoted to Group Manager in the strategic management and capital solutions service group of HRG.

Lauren has deep knowledge of funding programs and more than 15 years of experience in community planning and economic development.  She puts this expertise to work to help communities optimize operations and proactively manage their infrastructure. She is a strategic thinker who excels at helping communities define their goals, prioritize projects to meet those goals, and develop funding strategies to support them.  Before joining HRG, she served as executive director of a non-profit downtown revitalization organization.

 

ABOUT HRG

HRG assists with the planning, design, and management of communities throughout Pennsylvania and the surrounding states. They optimize places for health, prosperity, and enjoyment with a focus on long-term value. The foundation of their work is civil engineering, but their team has diverse expertise in community planning and management, landscape architecture, environmental compliance, and sustainability. For more information, visit their website at www.hrg-inc.com

HRG Clients Obtain $35 Million in Latest Round of PENNVEST Funding

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HRG helped our clients obtain more than $35 million in grants and loans from the most recent round of funding announced by PENNVEST this month. More than a third of the funding PENNVEST announced is going to clients HRG helped apply to the program.

The following grant and loan recipients received application assistance from HRG:

Houtzdale Municipal Authority in Clearfield County
The authority received a $22 million loan to replace 185,000 feet of waterline and 1,200 service lines and meter pits. This project will address water loss and ensure reliability of the system. (Our State College office manager Jeff Garrigan will be presenting this project at the Pennsylvania Municipal Authorities’ Conference this September alongside Houtzdale’s plant superintendant John Gallagher. Be sure to attend this workshop for valuable advice on controlling non-revenue water loss.)

Stoneboro Borough in Mercer County
The borough received a $2.6 million loan and $2.9 million grant to install a new storage reservoir and replace 19,500 feet of waterline, fire hydrants, and service connections.

Clarion Borough in Clarion County
The borough received a $684,078 loan and $1.2 million grant to install 22 storm water inlets and 2,835 feet of corrugated metal pipe to connect with the existing conveyance system. The work will help to prevent recurrent flooding of homes and businesses.

Lower Swatara Township in Dauphin County
The township received a $5 million loan to replace a 48-inch outfall and install 7,245 feet of new storm sewer, along with 210 feet of drainage swales. This project will also help to prevent the flooding of private properties.

(The full list of grant and loan recipients is available in this press release from Governor Wolfe.)

HRG’s financial services team has extensive experience applying for and winning grant and loan assistance from the Pennsylvania Infrastructure Investment Authority. Over the years, we have obtained more than $500 million in grants and loans for our clients from this program, and we can help you find grant and loan opportunities for your water, sewer, and stormwater projects.

Contact a member of our Financial Services Team to discuss grant and loan opportunities for your community.

Wyoming Valley Sanitary Authority Wins Governor’s Award for Local Government Excellence

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The Wyoming Valley Sanitary Authority (WVSA) received the Governor’s Award for Local Government Excellence at a ceremony in Harrisburg on April 11, 2018. WVSA was honored for spearheading an innovative, regional approach to stormwater management that is saving municipalities in Luzerne County millions of dollars on their regulatory compliance and pollutant reduction efforts.  Herbert, Rowland & Grubic, Inc. (HRG) helped WVSA develop this approach.

 

Hundreds of communities across Pennsylvania are required to apply for a permit under the state Department of Environmental Protection’s MS4 program. This program is designed to manage stormwater runoff to prevent pollutants from entering our watersheds and reduce the risk of flooding. The latest round of permitting requires many communities to cut the level of pollutants they discharge to a particular watershed by as much as 10% over the next five years. The cost of producing and implementing these pollutant reduction plans can be too much for many local governments whose budgets are already stretched thin.

With that in mind, WVSA asked HRG to prepare a feasibility study focused on whether regional cooperation among all the municipalities in the county could lower the cost of compliance.  According to HRG’s study, the approach will indeed save participating municipalities more than $200 million over the next 20 years.  Some savings come from sharing the cost of planning and other fixed expenses, but the biggest savings come from the construction of best management practices meant to help the communities reach their pollutant reduction goals. Working together, the municipalities can construct fewer, more effective projects that do a better job of reducing pollution for a lower cost than municipalities would be able to achieve on their own.

 

Toby Creek Impoundment

How Municipalities in the Wyoming Valley are Cutting Stormwater Management Costs by up to 90%

Learn more about this excerpt from an article about WVSA’s stormwater program in The Authority magazine. The first in a series of articles on WVSA, this piece discusses the many ways regional cooperation will save municipalities money over the next five years.

 

ABOUT THE WYOMING VALLEY SANITARY AUTHORITY

The Wyoming Valley Sanitary Authority (WVSA) has been providing wastewater treatment service for residents of Luzerne County since 1962. WVSA’s service area includes 35 municipalities from Harveys Lake to Pittston to Newport Township. Learn more about the authority and its services at www.wvsa.org

ABOUT HRG

Herbert, Rowland & Grubic, Inc. (HRG) is a nationally ranked design firm providing civil engineering, surveying, and environmental services. The firm was founded in Harrisburg in 1962 and has grown to employ more than 200 people in West Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Ohio.  For more information, please visit the website at www.hrg-inc.com.

Adrienne Vicari Named One of Central PA’s Top 40 Under 40

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Adrienne VicariThe Central Penn Business Journal named Adrienne Vicari to its 23nd annual Forty Under 40 list, which honors individuals for their commitment to business growth, professional excellence and the Central Pennsylvania community.  She and the other honorees will receive their award at a banquet on October 2 at the Hilton Harrisburg.

Adrienne is the financial services practice area leader at Herbert, Rowland & Grubic, Inc. She has more than 15 years of experience in financial consulting, project management and engineering design for municipal wastewater, water and stormwater clients. In her current role with the firm, she uses asset management and capital improvement planning as tools to complete long-range strategic financial planning for her clients.

But she began her career at HRG in a very different role: as a professional engineer designing water and wastewater treatment facilities. She quickly developed an interest in helping her water and wastewater clients obtain and manage their funding for capital improvement projects and transitioned into the firm’s financial service group. As communities have developed a growing need for increased stormwater management funding and utility valuation, she has become an industry leader in these areas, as well.

Russ McIntosh, a vice president of HRG, says:

“Adrienne is an unstoppable force. When she sees something needs done, she dives right in and gives it everything she has. She is extremely knowledgeable of the issues municipal water quality professionals face and very creative in addressing those challenges. There is nothing she can’t or won’t do to help her clients succeed.”

Adrienne Vicari volunteers for STEM educationThis dedication extends outside the office to the Central Pennsylvania community, as well. Adrienne encourages young people to achieve success in science, technology engineering, and math related fields by participating in STEM-related events like the “Introduce a Girl to Engineering Day” at the Whitaker Center. She also serves as a board member with the Girl Scouts in the Heart of Pennsylvania organization and takes part in their annual STEM expo. In addition, she coaches Central Penn Mini Sticks field hockey and a Cumberland Valley softball 10U team.

She also co-founded a women’s volunteer group for West Shore mothers that encourages them to pursue diverse volunteer opportunities with their children. The group has had a significant impact on mid-state organizations such as Caitlin Smiles, Leg Up Farm, Ronald McDonald House, Dress for Success, and others.

 

ABOUT HRG

Originally founded in 1962, HRG has grown to be a nationally ranked Top 500 Design Firm, providing civil engineering, surveying and environmental services to public and private sector clients. The 200-person employee-owned firm currently has office locations in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and West Virginia. For more information, please visit the website at www.hrg-inc.com.

 

Dauphin County Infrastructure Bank Honored with Governor’s Award

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Herbert, Rowland & Grubic, Inc. (HRG) is pleased to announce that our client Dauphin County received a Governor’s Award for Local Government Excellence for the infrastructure bank program we helped them create. The award for “innovative community or government initiative” was presented to Dauphin County officials at the Governor’s Residence on April 12, 2017. Commissioners George Hartwick, Jeff Haste, and Mike Pries attended the ceremony with George Connor, the executive director of Dauphin County’s Department of Community and Economic Development and the administrator of the infrastructure bank program.

HRG worked with PennDOT and Dauphin County officials to develop this program, which provides a creative solution to one of local government’s biggest challenges: successfully maintaining and replacing infrastructure. It leverages the county’s Liquid Fuels funding and the underutilized Pennsylvania Infrastructure Bank program to stretch the value of local government dollars. In its first three years, Dauphin County turned an annual investment of $325,000 in Liquid Fuels money into 10 projects worth $11 million: 7 bridges, 1 streetscape, 1 intersection improvement, and 1 traffic signal improvement.

DCIB turns 325K into 10 projects worth $11M

While people on both sides of the aisle agree that infrastructure improvements are badly needed, the debate often stalls over where the money will come from to pay for these improvements. The Dauphin County Infrastructure Bank shows that new revenue is not necessarily needed to begin addressing these problems; applying existing revenue in new ways can help us make significant progress. By combining several sources of funding – each of which would’ve been inadequate to meet the infrastructure need alone – the Dauphin County Infrastructure Bank has accomplished so much more for the county’s residents than these funding sources could’ve done individually.

Brian Emberg is an engineer who helped develop this program. He began working with the county in the 1980s on a similarly forward-thinking program that helped the county eliminate significant structural deficiency of its bridges. (In 1984, one-third of the county’s bridges were structurally deficient, but today the county has no load-posted, structurally deficient bridges at all, thanks to a bridge management system they designed with HRG.)

Emberg says, “Dauphin County’s officials are dedicated public servants and true visionaries. They continually challenge the status quo to deliver the best service to their constituents for the highest return on public tax dollars. This program provides a great example to other counties on how the seemingly impossible task of addressing our infrastructure can be solved.”

Indeed, HRG is currently in talks with counties around the state about implementing similar infrastructure bank programs of their own. Though Dauphin County uses its program for transportation improvements, the program can be used to fund any type of infrastructure, depending on the sources of money used to capitalize the loan program.

  • Funded by the Dauphin County Infrastructure Bank: Middletown Borough Streetscape

  • Funded by the Dauphin County Infrastructure Bank: Londonderry Township culvert

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HRG Named a Utility Valuation Expert by the PA Public Utility Commission

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Many municipalities are considering selling their water and wastewater systems in order to address long-term budget and debt obligations. As one of PA’s first Utility Valuation Experts, HRG is ready to help municipalities attain fair market value for these assets.

HRG can help you determine your utility's fair market value as a registered Utility Valuation Expert

 

Herbert, Rowland & Grubic, Inc. (HRG) was recently recognized by the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission as a Utility Valuation Expert. Under legislation signed by Governor Tom Wolfe in 2016, municipalities wishing to sell their utility assets to a PUC-regulated utility can engage the services of a registered Utility Valuation Expert to determine fair market value of their system.

The program is voluntary, but it benefits both the municipality and the potential buyer by presenting a more accurate picture of a utility’s value than the traditional method.

In Pennsylvania, the purchase of water and wastewater systems by a regulated utility must be approved by the Public Utility Commission. Traditionally, the commission has considered the value of a system to be equal to its depreciated original cost (construction cost minus grants and depreciation). This approach did not consider the potential income that could be generated from the assets and frequently resulted in valuations so low that municipalities couldn’t benefit from a sale.

At the same time, with no consideration to the market or revenue, potential buyers could not be sure whether they would achieve an adequate return on their investment with the purchase.

To remedy these problems, Act 12 of 2016 created a new, voluntary approach to utility valuation based on fair market value. Under this system, the buyer and the seller each retain a registered Utility Valuation Expert to conduct independent appraisals of the utility using industry standards: cost, market, and income approaches. These appraisals use data on the physical system assets that was assessed by a professional engineer retained by both parties.

After both appraisals are submitted, an average of the fair market value calculated in each one is used as the final valuation.

HRG was one of the first firms to be listed on the PUC’s official Registry of Utility Valuation Experts. The firm specializes in providing financial services to the water and wastewater industry and has conducted numerous system reviews and valuation studies for municipalities throughout the state. Vice President Russ McIntosh has published dozens of articles on water and wastewater system financing and was honored by the Pennsylvania Municipal Authority Association for outstanding contributions and exceptional service to the industry in 2014. McIntosh has also served as an expert witness on matters of utility financing in several court cases.

“Our goal at HRG is to provide a fair and honest accounting of a utility’s value, so that the municipality can decide what is best for the long-term health and financial stability of its community,” McIntosh says. “We can go beyond mere valuation to help communities weigh all of their options for generating the money they seek to address budget needs while protecting the value of their most important assets.”

For more information about the utility valuation process defined in Act 12 of 2016, please contact Russ McIntosh at (717) 564-1121 or rmcintosh@hrg-inc.com.