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CPA giant snaps up Harrisburg’s Andculture

Harrisburg-based Andculture is poised to become part of Chicago-based accounting and advisory firm RSM US LLP. RSM said Thursday it has reached an agreement to buy Andculture, which specializes in marketing strategy, design and technology, Terms of the deal were not disclosed. But it is expected to close June 1, according to a press release. RSM was […]

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Local banking leader named to top job at PA chamber

Pennsylvania’s statewide business chamber has tapped a local banking executive as its next leader. Luke Bernstein, an executive at Shippensburg-based Orrstown Financial Services, is poised to become the next president and CEO of the Pennsylvania Chamber of Business and Industry. As of June 15, he will be taking over for Gene Barr, who announced his retirement last fall after […]

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Fledgling venture fund makes first investments

After raising roughly $10 million, a startup venture fund in York has disclosed an inaugural round of investments. Martin Fedorko, left, and Alexa Born founded White Rose Ventures in 2020 (photo/submitted). White Rose Ventures has plowed $1.73 million into companies in Lancaster, Harrisburg and YorkThe firm also unveiled a nonprofit, Braided River Collective, designed to support entrepreneurs around […]

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Investor wants new board members for PeoplesBank parent

The war of words over a regional bank is morphing into a war over board seats. An activist investor is nominating three members to the board of Codorus Valley Bancorp, a trio of executives the investor believes would better represent the interests of shareholders.The investor, Abbott Cooper of New York hedge fund Driver Management, has been pushing since last summer […]

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A look back at M&A in Central PA

The past year has been a busy one for mergers and acquisitions in Central Pennsylvania. Take a closer look at the action in this month-by-month recap for 2021. Unless otherwise indicated, the deal terms were not disclosed. January: U-GRO Learning Centres, a Derry Township-based preschool chain, was purchased by Michigan-based Learning Care Group, one of […]

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West Shore firm partners with Wells Fargo to distribute new credit-application tech

For nearly two decades, Cumberland County tech company Versatile Credit has been making it easier for businesses to offer in-store credit. Its latest device, called Snap Sign, makes it as easy as pointing a mobile phone at a plastic sign. The signs are a secure, contactless alternative to in-store kiosks, tablets or paper applications that […]

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Boyer & Ritter

Regional accounting and consulting firm Boyer & Ritter has hired eight associates, including three who previously interned with the firm and two who have accounting experience working with businesses, nonprofits and governmental entities. Madison Bucher has a bachelor’s degree in accounting with a minor in economics and a master’s degree in accounting from Bloomsburg University. […]

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Harrisburg offices sell ahead of planned conversion

Another office property in downtown Harrisburg is slated for conversion to apartments.  Breneman Properties LLC, headed by former Penn State football-player-turned entrepreneur Adam Breneman, paid $370,000 for the 8,300-square-foot property at 315 N. Second St., according to county deed records. The three-building property was previously owned by the Pennsylvania Health Care Association, which represents nursing homes, […]

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Ephrata bank buying Maryland lender

After years of steady growth in Lancaster, Lebanon and Berks counties, the parent of Ephrata National Bank is crossing state lines. ENB Financial Corp. said yesterday it agreed to buy Cecil Bancorp, a small bank in northeastern Maryland. The cash deal, valued at $30.8 million, is the first bank acquisition in ENB’s history, which stretches back to 1881. […]

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Choices Healthcare

Michael Link has been named president and CEO of Choices Healthcare, a regional hospice provider, effective Oct. 1. He is succeeding Steve Knaub, who is retiring this year after leading the Lancaster-based nonprofit since 2014. Link joined what was then called Hospice of Lancaster County in 2001 as an information systems trainer. He advanced into leadership roles, most recently as […]

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Car wash chain shells out $1.9M for East York site

Shiny Shell Carwash, one of several car wash chains spreading across Central Pennsylvania over the last few year, is planning to open a car wash in Springettsbury Township, York County. The Utah-based company paid $1.925 million in June for two acres at 3021 E. Market St., site of a shuttered motel known as Barnhart’s Inn. The company […]

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Data center plans provoke debate over impact, process

At a meeting last night, developers shared more details on their plans for a $15 billion data center complex near Carlisle. Residents shared a barrage of doubts. Over two hours, they questioned how much water and electricity the centers would use. They questioned how the developers picked the 700-acre tract of farmland in Middlesex Township where […]

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McNees Wallace & Nurick

Amara Riley has joined the litigation group in the Lancaster office of McNees Wallace & Nurick. Riley brings more than 15 years of government and public sector experience. Before joining McNees, she was an attorney advisor for the U.S. Department of Justice’s Executive Office for Immigration Review. She also gained trial and appellate experience as […]

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East York plaza sold

A local investment group doing business as East Market Street Plaza RE LLC paid $3.4 million for East Market Street Plaza in Springettsbury Township, York County, according to agents with York-based real estate firm Bennett Williams Commercial. The 18,650-square-foot retail strip at 3915 E. Market St. had been owned by a Lancaster-based partnership called East Market Street Group LLC, […]

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Firm consolidating in former TE/AMP plant

When electrical components manufacturer SESCO outgrew its Mont Alto plant in the mid-2010s, the company leased a second facility in Waynesboro. The company has operated in both buildings for a decade, according to SESCO founder, owner and president David Souders. But now, SESCO’s 87 employees are poised for a reunion. The company is buying a former TE Connectivity plant […]

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York County Community Foundation

The York County Community Foundation has hired three staff members. Courtney Taylor has been named to a new position of grants program officer, community partnerships. She will coordinate with the York County Nonprofit Collaborative, a coalition of funders and nonprofit representatives dedicated to advancing the key priorities of the nonprofit sector, including leadership development and […]

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Former furniture factory sold

A New Jersey-based investment group operating as Hanover Realty LLC bought a roughly 132,000-square-foot building at 433 Ridge Ave. in Hanover, according to Lemoyne-based real estate firm NAI CIR. The firm’s Nik Sgagias and Tony Plakas facilitated the transaction, which took place via the Ten-X Auction site. Sgagias said Hanover Realty plans to market the building for […]

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Investor ups stake in Harrisburg bank

A family trust affiliated with George E. Norcross III, a New Jersey business leader and political power broker, has been steadily boosting its stake in Harrisburg-based Mid Penn Bancorp as the bank expands in Philadelphia and New Jersey. Indiana Pacific General Trust, whose beneficiaries are Norcross’s son and daughter, disclosed last year that it held a 6.2% stake […]

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Manufacturer buys playgrounds specialist

Lancaster-based flooring maker Ecore International has purchased an Ohio-based company that specializes in playground surfacing. Based in Copley, Ohio, near Akron, Pro-Techs Surfacing LLC sells, designs and installs the surfacing.  Terms of the transaction — Ecore’s second in as many months — were not disclosed. Pro-Techs, which employs 22 people, does no manufacturing. But the company’s sales and installation […]

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Herbert Rowland & Grubic Inc.

Ryan Albright has been promoted to chief marketing officer at Herbert Rowland & Grubic Inc. a new role for the regional engineering firm. Albright, who has worked at HRG since 2014, had been director of marketing. In his new role, reporting to the firm’s CEO, he will align HRG’s marketing channel with broader strategic business […]

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Former controller accused of theft from regional business

A woman who worked as a senior controller at York-based Kinsley Enterprises allegedly funneled more than $95,000 from the company into an account for a Lancaster-area restaurant she and her husband own, according to an affidavit of probable cause filed by Pennsylvania State Police. The woman, Kathryn Khuc of Red Lion, allegedly disguised the payments so they […]

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Brown Plus

Courtney Catlin has been promoted to the role of learning and development manager for Brown Plus, a new position for the Camp Hill-based accounting and advisory firm. She had been a tax supervisor with more than five years of experience providing tax services to clients across a variety of industries. She has a bachelor’s degree […]

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Government

Deal closes on Reagan building

A buyer has finalized the $10.01 million purchase of the Ronald Reagan Federal Building in downtown Harrisburg. However, the buyer’s identity remains a mystery.A deed filed with Dauphin County lists the buyer as R.R.F. Building LLC,which has a tax billing address at a law firm in South Carolina. Efforts to reach the law firm, De Bruin Law, were not […]

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Health Care

Harrisburg’s Nauman Smith absorbed by larger law firm

One of Harrisburg’s oldest law firms is winding down.  Five attorneys and a team of administrative professionals from 152-year-old Nauman Smith Shissler & Hall are joining the capital city office of Philadelphia-based Cohen Seglias Pallas Greenhall & Furman, effective Feb. 1. The move caps conversations that started in early 2023 between the two firms, said Steven Williams, the […]

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State court backs developer in warehouse spat

A state appeals court has sided with a local developer aiming to build a warehouse complex in Swatara Township, Dauphin County. The decision is the latest in a long-running battle over whether warehouses should be allowed on tracts along Route 322 east of Harrisburg, near Penhar Drive. State court shot down a previous developer’s efforts in […]

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Court voids price guide for workers’ comp drugs

A state court has shelved the Red Book, a compendium of wholesale drug prices that state officials routinely use to settle disputes over drug costs in Pennsylvania’s worker’s comp program.  In a ruling this week, Commonwealth Court disqualified use of the book after an insurer challenged it, claiming the book’s listed prices were not accurate.  […]

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UPMC sued for allegedly misclassifying workers

UPMC is facing a class-action lawsuit filed by a respiratory therapist who claims she was misclassified as an independent contractor when she worked at the health system’s Harrisburg hospital in 2022. The suit, filed last week in an Allegheny County court, claims the therapist should have been classified as an employee and paid overtime when she […]

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Inch appeals decision that nixed industrial development

An affiliate of real estate developer Inch & Co. is challenging a decision that reversed the zoning on a parcel of land it owns near Route 30 and Pennsylvania Avenue in Manchester Township, York County. Township officials rezoned the property in 2021 for industrial development. But after fierce public outcry and a challenge from the owner […]

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Court voids PA carbon-emission rules

A state court has tossed aside regulations that would have enrolled Pennsylvania in a multistate carbon-cutting program, regulations that were a climate-change priority for the former administration of Gov. Tom Wolf. At issue was whether the heart of the program — a market in which companies must buy credits to emit carbon — represented a fee […]

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Court sides with solar firm in zoning battle

Gratz borough in Dauphin County failed to properly advertise a meeting where it set stricter zoning standards for solar energy systems even as a company was seeking permission to build a 17-megawatt project there. That was the ruling last week from a three-judge panel of Pennsylvania’s Commonwealth Court, which upheld a 2022 decision by Dauphin […]

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Developer loses appeal over denial of mixed-use project

A Lancaster County developer has lost its bid to overturn a zoning decision blocking a mixed-use development in Manheim Township. In a ruling this week, a county judge upheld the township’s denial of plans for Oregon Village, a proposed development that would bring housing, offices, shops and a hotel to a nearly 76-acre tract that […]

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Defamation claim raised in suit over fraud loss

Mid Penn Bank is firing back at claims it did not adequately protect a nonprofit from fraud. In a legal filing this month, the Harrisburg-based bank alleges that the Center for Independent Living of Central Pennsylvania harmed the bank’s reputation in a press release issued in February announcing a lawsuit against the bank. In the press release, the center claimed […]

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October sale sought for beleaguered Harrisburg apartments

The bankrupt owners of an uptown Harrisburg apartment complex want to hire a firm that specializes in real estate liquidation to sell the property in an auction. In a motion filed in bankruptcy court, apartment owners Uptown Partners LP are seeking court approval to hire Hilco Real Estate LLC to oversee a sale of the complex, known as Governor’s Square. […]

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Suit aims to stop Centric merger

A shareholder of Centric Financial is seeking to block the Harrisburg-area bank’s planned merger into a western Pennsylvania bank. In a class-action lawsuit filed this month in Cumberland County court, shareholder Charles Reinhardt claims the $144 million deal undervalues Centric, which is based in Lower Paxton Township, Dauphin County. The lawsuit also takes aim at other terms of […]

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Court ruling could prompt millions in corporate tax refunds

Thanks to a recent court ruling, the commonwealth of Pennsylvania could be on the hook for more than $100 million in tax refunds to businesses. The ruling came in a case that arose over provisions outlining how companies can use past losses to lower their tax bills. Some corporate taxpayers have claimed, successfully, that provisions […]

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Court rules local stormwater fee is a tax

West Chester University and the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education do not have to pay an annual six-figure stormwater fee imposed by West Chester Borough. Why? Because Pennsylvania’s Commonwealth Court ruled yesterday that the fee is a tax — and state entities don’t have to pay taxes. In a lawsuit filed in 2018, the borough argued that the assessments […]

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York law firms link up

Three York-based law firms are becoming one in a merger slated to close Oct. 1. The firms are Blakey Yost Bupp & Rausch; Griest Himes Herrold Reynosa; and MPL Law Firm.“We all have great respect for each other and we have always worked well together even when on opposing sides,” said James Sanders, an attorney at MPL. “We decided that […]

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Online retailers win sales-tax fight

A state court has sided with online retailers who say they are being unfairly targeted by Pennsylvania tax collectors. In a ruling Friday, Commonwealth Court blocked efforts by the Pennsylvania Department of Revenue to collect state sales and personal income taxes from the retailers, which sell their products through Amazon.At issue are back taxes the state […]

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Manufacturing

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Real Estate

Hanover-area plaza goes for $28.75M

A Hanover-area mall is under new ownership. Plymouth Meeting-based real estate company Pennmark Management paid $28.75 million for Gateway Hanover, a 192,774 square-foot shopping center just north of the York County borough. It was developed starting in 2010.The seller was Hanover-based Conewago North Ridge Partners LP, according to Brad Rohrbaugh, retail director for York-based real estate firm Bennett Williams […]

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Text marketing firm moves to Lancaster

Last fall, Lancaster-based private equity firm PennSpring Capital bought a majority stake in Mobiniti, a text marketing firm based in Wilkes-Barre. This week, a PennSpring entity paid $1.55 million for a building in Lancaster where it plans to relocate the operations of Mobiniti, which employs about 20 people.The move brings Mobiniti closer to PennSpring, which offers support to […]

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Youth-focused nonprofit buys Front Street office

A Harrisburg-based, youth-focused nonprofit has purchased the longtime home of the Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association at 3899 N. Front St. Youth Advocate Programs Inc. paid $2.235 million for the 18,000 square-foot building in Susquehanna Township, according to Dauphin County deed records.The nonprofit — which provides community-based services to at-risk youth — plans to move around 80 staff members there […]

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Camp Hill firm forges ahead with $29M project

A mixed-use development is taking shape along Route 15 in Upper Allen Township, Cumberland County. Camp Hill developer Linlo Properties began site work in May for the project, dubbed The Mills at Shepherdstown Crossing.Once completed, it will bring 54 apartments, retail space, a Burger King and a Chick-fil-A to the intersection of Gettysburg Pike and South Market Street, which offers access to […]

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Harsco Headquarters sold to local developer

As it gears up for a move to Philadelphia, Harsco has unloaded its longtime Wormleysburg headquarters this year for $4.3 million. However, the roughly 42,000 square-foot building will remain a corporate headquarters.A partnership that includes Lemoyne-based Rhodes Development Group bought the building and plans to move there, along with two of its operating divisions, according to Larry Kluger, president and […]

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York-area office building sold for nearly $6M

Seeking a more modern office environment for its York-area staff, a Lancaster-based residential real estate firm is moving down the street. Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices Homesale Realty bought an office building at 2600 Eastern Blvd. in Springettsbury Township and plans to move its staff there in mid to late September, according to Rod Messick, the firm’s CEO.Homesale Realty plans […]

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Regional construction firm changes hands

When Seth Hughes first stepped onto a construction site as a teenager, he didn’t think about owning a construction company someday. But as his career advanced, it started to emerge as a goal, Hughes said.The goal is now a reality. Hughes has purchased Mechanicsburg-based Mowery Construction from its previous owner, David Cross. The pair began laying the groundwork […]

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Former Harrisburg hospital for sale, eyed for apartments

A piece of Harrisburg history is on the market — and potentially headed for a makeover. Penn Center Harrisburg, the former Polyclinic Hospital campus, is being listed at an asking price of $22 million — and with a sketch plan showing the office property as an apartment complex. “I think that the office need in Harrisburg is low,” […]

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Regional real estate firms merge

One of the region’s largest residential real estate firms just got larger. As of July 12, Lancaster-based Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices Homesale Realty has absorbed Brownstone Real Estate, adding two offices and 38 agents in Lebanon and Hershey.Terms of the merger were not disclosed.“After 51 years in business, it was important for us to join a […]

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West Shore construction firm on the move

RLS Construction Group LLC is investing nearly $1.5 million to buy and remodel the former Hampden Township municipal building at 230 S. Sporting Hill Road. The new location in Cumberland County will allow the company to consolidate operations that are currently at two locations, said Bob Schopfer, owner, president and CEO of RLS Construction.The company […]

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Developer lifts curtain on plans for federal building

A developer is filling in some of the details on its plans to transform the Ronald Reagan Federal Building in Harrisburg into “The Federal” — a 200-unit luxury apartment building crowned with a rooftop bar and a pair of restaurants. Developer Global Ocean Investments had already unveiled a goal of remaking the 250,000 square-foot building […]

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Brewery on tap for mixed-use project

Burkentine Builders is gearing up to finish a mixed-use project that will bring another brewery to southern York County. The Hanover-based builder held a topping-off ceremony April 25 for the roughly $5 million project, which is bringing two buildings totaling 10,000 square feet of commercial space and 20 apartments to the borough of New Freedom.Construction […]

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Regional projects land $50M-plus in state funds

State officials on Friday unveiled more than $50 million in grants earmarked for projects around Central Pennsylvania, including a life sciences incubator in Lancaster, a hotel renovation on the West Shore and a park along the Codorus Creek in York. Other beneficiaries include Rock Lititz and the partnership developing a mixed-use apartment building near the […]

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York-area firm buys former restaurant for new HQ

Doceo, a York-based technology services company, plans to move its headquarters this fall to a former Ruby Tuesday restaurant in York Township.The 6,000 square-foot space is larger than the 4,300 square feet the company currently rents in a multi-tenant building at 1499 S. Queen St. in Spring Garden Township, according to spokesperson Maya Miller. It […]

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