Plan eases payment for utility the vaccinemaker needed for expansion.
Monroe County commissioners Wednesday approved a tax incremental financing plan to help fund a $40 million
central sewage system designed to keep the nation's sole supplier of injectable flu vaccine in the Poconos.
The $3.5 million plan, which also was approved by Pocono Township and the Pocono Mountain School District,
will now direct property taxes from the planned expansion to the proposed sewer line, which will run from Bartonsville north
along the Route 611 corridor to Mount Pocono.
Sanofi Pasteur, which produces more than 50 million doses of injectable flu vaccine annually, has an on-site sewer system that's
near capacity. In December, the company threatened to kill a planned $160 million expansion of its vaccine facility unless
the state and Pocono Township agreed to build new sewer capacity.
The flu vaccine expansion is expected to add nearly 350 jobs to Sanofi Pasteur's sprawling Swiftwater campus,
which currently employs 1,500, making it one of the largest employers in the region.
Gov. Ed Rendell, with the help of U.S. Sens. Arlen Specter and Rick Santorum, put together a package
that also included $10 million in federal funding, a $22 million PennVest loan and a $5 million grant from the state
Commonwealth Authority.
The commissioners approved the tax financing plan without comment, and the first $3.5 million in property
taxes generated by the Sanofi Pasteur expansion will bypass the county, township and school district and go directly toward
paying for the sewer system...
The $10 million in federal funding was included in the recent $82 billion supplemental appropriations
bill for the Iraq war and tsunami relief. Specter and Santorum, along with U.S. Rep. Paul Kanjorski, D-11th District,
cited past shortages in flu vaccine along with national security as reasons for the federal funding.
Pocono Township Supervisor L. Patrick Ross said work has begun on the project, mainly environmental studies,
and construction should begin in 2006. The project, he said, should take three to four years to complete.
''We're moving forward and will get this done as quickly as possible,'' Ross said.
