Olyphant Borough Council will vote Tuesday to apply for a $250,000 infrastructure grant and consider an amended land development agreement for a sprawling industrial park project off Marshwood Road.
Council will vote on the motions regarding the proposed Triboro Industrial Park and associated Triboro Commerce Park — a project at least six years in the making that will build more than 4.5 million square feet of warehouse space on a large swath of land in the middle of Route 247, the Casey Highway and Marshwood Road.
According to its meeting agenda, council will consider adopting a resolution allowing the borough to apply for a $250,000 state grant for infrastructure development at the Triboro Commerce Park. Council will also vote to confirm a memo to the land development agreement between the borough and the Triboro Industrial Park, as well as confirming a modified agreement dated April 25. The original land development agreement between the borough and Triboro was originally approved Nov. 9, 2022, according to the agenda.
The Triboro parks encompass nearly 1,000 acres, with the industrial park being about 561.63 acres on the east side of the property and the commerce park being 411.589 acres on the west side, according to two $2 million open-end mortgages recorded with the Lackawanna County recorder of deeds on April 17, 2024. The Triboro Industrial Park transferred some of its property to the Triboro Commerce Park across two $1 property transactions recorded Dec. 29, 2021.
Charles DeNaples, the son of Keystone Sanitary Landfill co-owner Dominick DeNaples, signed the April 2024 mortgages as the sole member of both the Triboro Industrial Park and Triboro Commerce Park.
Both the commerce and industrial park list 1210 Wheeler Ave., Dunmore, as their address, which is the same address as Smart Recycling Inc.
The Triboro Industrial Park is a four-building park with 4,522,880 square feet of warehouse space for lease, according to triboroindustrialpark.com. The warehouses will range from just under 1.067 million square feet to 1.184 million square feet. A brochure for the industrial park and its website advertise the site’s close proximity to multiple interstates, touting it as being within a one-day drive of 60% of the United States’ population and 40% of Canada’s.
The website also promotes the industrial park’s 10-year tax break.
In 2019, Olyphant council, the Mid Valley School Board and Lackawanna County commissioners approved a 10-year tax abatement term for the Triboro property, applying Local Economic Revitalization Tax Assistance status to 964 acres of the deteriorated, undeveloped land. Once the warehouses are built, the landowner will only pay 5% of taxes on improvements to the property for the first year, increasing by 5% in subsequent years. During the 10th and final year of the LERTA, the landowner will pay 50% of the value of the improvements before paying full taxes the following year.
In April 2022, the industrial park received $3 million through the state’s Redevelopment Assistance Capital Program, or RACP, with the funding going toward the first phase of the project and focusing on the eastern portion, including earthwork/excavation, clearing, utility relocation, mine mitigation, erosion, sedimentation controls and stormwater pond preparation, according to a press release at the time from state Sen. Marty Flynn, D-22, Dunmore.
Last year, the state Department of Environmental Protection extinguished a mine fire burning near the proposed industrial park. The fire began in 2004 when someone set a stolen car on fire, spreading to the mines below and burning beneath Olyphant for 20 years at the former Dolph Coal Co.’s Hannah Bell Slope Mine. A DEP contractor successfully extinguished the 7-acre fire in April 2024 as part of a project approved for up to $16.5 million.
Attempts to reach Olyphant solicitor and borough Manager C.J. Mustacchio and Scranton attorney Gregory J. Pascale, who represented Triboro in recent property transactions, were unsuccessful Monday afternoon.