BEAVER SPRINGS -- Where once officials were fighting the arrival of a drug and alcohol treatment center, supervisors in two western Snyder County municipalities are now arguing over whose township Firetree Ltd.'s facility will be located.

The bureaucratic rift has delayed the hiring of up to 30 workers for the Williamsport-based chemical abuse treatment facility, said Allen Ertel, the company's executive committee chairman.

"We feel very bad for (people who applied last year) because we could have had a fairly sizeable number of those people employed," Ertel said. "Because of the delay, we've lost a couple of senior people who live in the area, who were going to manage the facility."

Supervisors in Spring and Beaver townships are battling over where Firetree's property -- including the former Beaver-Adams Elementary School along Route 522 -- sits.

"It's been an ongoing thing since it's come out there," Spring Township Supervisor Dale Bishop said.

A small piece of the property on the east side is in Beaver Township, Bishop said, but the majority of the property is in Spring.

"They think there's tax money involved," Bishop said of Beaver Township officials. While real estate taxes probably will not be an issue because Firetree is a nonprofit organization, occupational taxes will be received by the township in which the land is located.

"Our solicitor told (Beaver Township officials) if they want to know exactly where it is, they should have it surveyed," Bishop said.

That has yet to happen. Should Beaver Township contest the issue, it has to pay for the land survey, which is costly.

The previous owner of the property paid his taxes in Spring Township, Bishop said.

Beaver Township officials did not reply to two messages left on their secretary's voice mail last week.

"They keep raising the issue, delaying approvals," said Ertel, the Firetree official. "Just that issue alone has held us up."

What Ertel finds most interesting is the change in attitude among township officials.

"These people were fighting to keep us out," he said. "Now they're fighting to keep us in."

His company will continue to renovate the building, and plans to open in mid- to late June, he said.

"We can build," he said, "and they can still argue about it."

The company will have spent approximately $1 million on the purchase of the building and renovations.

"We're spending a sizeable chunk of money there to do this place over, to make sure it's a very nice place," Ertel said.

Firetree has obtained a sewer permit, and is receiving bids for a sewer project. Workers have removed asbestos and completed much interior renovations.

The company plans to renovate bathrooms, install new plumbing and heating, and is looking into providing solar heat and making the building as environmentally friendly as possible.

Within the next couple of months, it will be hiring and training for up to 30 positions, including nurses, counselors, counselor assistants, maintenance workers and cooks.

The Beaver Springs facility will house a wide spectrum of drug and alcohol abusers from a detox program. The abusers' stays will be from a few days to a week, or up to 90 days. The facility will hold 50 to 55 beds.

Opposition dies down,

but fear remains

Local residents are a little quieter and reserved now than this time last year, but their concerns are just as big as ever when they talk about Firetree.

"There's nothing you can do about it," Beavertown resident Joe Sperka said Thursday. "They'll be here anyway."

Sperka signed a petition last year to keep Firetree from moving in, citing security issues as a concern.

A lot of people were against the project when it was first announced in 2008, Spring Township Supervisor Doug Garrison said. But recently, there hasn't been much talk about the issue.

After all, there's nothing anyone can do.

"We're not zoned here," Garrison said. "If we would have been zoned, we could have stopped it."

Township supervisors and the planning commission have already signed off on the project, Garrison said.

Yet concerns linger.

It is the unknown that scares him the most, Sperka said.

There was no explanation, he said, of who was going to be housed in the building, or how much security there would be. He is also afraid that a drug rehabilitation center might attract the wrong kind of crowd to western Snyder County.

Though not against the much-needed jobs coming into the area -- as of January, 1,800 people were unemployed in Snyder County -- Sperka still believes that Firetree officials could have better handled their entrance.

"They (Firetree) should have spent more time communicating with the community," Sperka said.

Other residents and business owners declined to comment on the issue.

Update talk

planned for April 8

The Firetree facility in Beaver Springs is a benign one and will be similar to its facility in Hummelstown, named Conewago Place, Ertel said.

"We never had any problems there," he said.

Conewago Place provides comprehensive services to referrals from single county authorities, managed care organizations, those who choose to pay themselves, as well as the offender population.

The treatment program specifically addresses chemical abuse. Firetree has a license from the state Department of Health to provide inpatient drug and alcohol treatment.

Officials from Firetree are expected to give an update on the facility to members of the Middlecreek Chamber of Commerce on April 8, said Bryan Hunsinger, local business owner and chamber president. Firetree is in its second year as a chamber member.

Hunsinger said he and several area residents in January took a daylong tour of Firetree's Hummelstown facility.

More jobs, and increased revenue in occupational taxes coming into the area, are pluses that the area will see once Firetree opens.

"It's always better to have all the property in your area occupied rather than unoccupied," Hunsinger said.

"We are a good, clean industry," Ertel said.

Unfortunately, many of the residents made up their minds early that Firetree was bad, he said. "Once people realize how decent we are, I don't think it will be an issue."

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