More than 100 readers per day
have checked out last week’s story about Chadds Ford Business Association
members getting updated on the Costco and Whole Foods stores coming to Concord
Township. That’s good for us here at ChaddsFordLive.com, but the interest could
bode well for the success of those two stores and for the economy of the
immediate region, especially Concord Township itself.
As Concord’s Supervisors’
Chairman Dominic Pileggi said during the CFBA luncheon in which he gave the
update, businesses help pay the township’s bills. Indeed, he’s previously said
that businesses make up 20 percent of Concord’s revenue. Compare that to other
townships such Chadds Ford or Pennsbury where businesses make up only 5 percent
of the tax base.
And while the aforementioned
stores will bring traffic into the area, that traffic will bring shoppers with
it, shoppers who will frequent other stores and stop for coffee or eat lunch or
dinner at other local restaurants. It’s the way a dynamic, symbiotic economy
works.
Businesses make money and they
fork over taxes to the local government, but they also provide other benefits.
Mr. Pileggi told the CFBA members that one of the first things his board wants
to hear from a developer is what the applicant will do for the roads, how they
will improve them.
The Costco development is a
case in point. Concord wanted dedication of Evergreen Drive, and will get the
roadway. Better still, the township will get an improved Conchester Road,
widened, graded and repaved from Evergreen to Route 1.
Businesses also provide jobs
and employees need to eat somewhere close.
Not all development is
necessarily good. Some simply fail to produce the desired results. There are
also bad builders and unscrupulous business people, but supervisors should be
able to weed them out. Most do because most, even those with which we disagree,
are honest and diligent.
Fortunately there’s been no
fraudulent development around here. Even developments that were unwanted by the
majority of the population have turned out well. Consider the Toll Bros.
development in Chadds Ford. It resulted in an unobtrusive housing development
that got Chadds Ford Township a much-needed sewer plant and will also provide
the township with acres of much-wanted open space. (The value of that will be
determined by what the township supervisors decide to do with that open space.)
The difference between
development in Concord and Chadds Ford is that things are more active in
Concord. Costco, Whole Foods and the possibility of a Wegman’s are happening
now, while things are static in Chadds Ford as in most other townships. The
activity speaks well for Concord.
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