Former Fort Pitt Brewery complex, a headache for years in Jeannette, to be torn down

Mar. 19—Demolition of the old Fort Pitt Brewery in West Jeannette could start this summer.

Officials are planning a public meeting in May before opening bids for the demolition work. Brian Lawrence, director of the Westmoreland County Redevelopment Authority and Land Bank, expects the work to take about six months.

"Our goal is to prepare the site so it can be reused, at a minimum, for industrial use," he said.

Preparation work has been ongoing for months since the land bank acquired the complex of crumbling, red brick buildings in a judicial sale in August 2022. The buildings have been a headache for city officials for years.

They are littered with debris, and a large section of a rear wall has collapsed. Parts of several roofs are missing, including on one building that is separated from homes only by an alley. On top of that, vandals and other troublemakers have broken in. A suspicious fire broke out in 2017.

An environmental assessment of the property indicated the need for additional testing because of decades of industrial use, Lawrence said. A second assessment will be conducted after the demolition and help guide potential reuse of the property.

Testing has determined that about 3 million gallons of water in the basement is groundwater. Initial testing of the water classified it as residual waste, but more detailed — and costly — subsequent examinations that involved filtering the water showed it wasn't.

"This is not something that's a danger to public health," Lawrence said.

Material onsite that can be used as clean fill will be crushed and used to fill the hole, he said.

"There's frankly no other way to do it because you can't pump it out," he said. "The pumps would have to be running forever."

So far, about $60,000 to $70,000 has been spent on preparations, with possibly another $750,000 in demolition costs. The project is being paid through a $10.4 million pot of American Rescue Plan funding set aside by Westmoreland County for blight remediation in seven communities, including Jeannette.

The land bank will be expanding the existing fence perimeter around the site to provide for more space between the buildings and neighbors

to accommodate the project. Jeannette City Manager Ethan Keedy said officials will be working with a neighbor who has junk in the area where the fence will need to be moved.

"We're going to do what we can to get him to clean that up," Keedy said. "It's been an ongoing issue that we've tried to rectify in the past."

Keedy hopes the project will help restore pride in the neighborhood and the city as a whole.

"It is going to be a spur that this city needs," he said. "The city of Jeannette, the residents should be happy that the city and the county recognized that as an issue and did whatever they could to rectify it."

Officials aren't expecting road closures, but if they occur, they will be intermittent. A meeting was held last week with city officials and local business leaders.

In conjunction with the public meeting in May, Lawrence said mailings will be sent to those living within 500 feet of the property that provide details about the project and phone numbers.

Officials are expected to be at city hall before the city council meeting on May 9 to provide details about the project and listen to questions and concerns.

Frank Trigona's Rufus Corp. acquired the brewery in 2002. The Jeannette businessman died in 2015, leaving behind thousands in delinquent taxes.

The site previously served as home to Victor Brewing Co., which organized in 1907. Fort Pitt Brewing bought the property in 1941, according to news accounts. In the mid-1950s, Papercraft Corp. expanded its gift wrap manufacturing operations there before the plant went dormant in the mid-1970s. It was later purchased by Laurel Mould, which produced plastic food containers. The property was sold at sheriff's sale and thereafter purchased by Rufus Corp.

Renatta Signorini is a TribLive reporter covering breaking news, crime, courts and Jeannette. She has been working at the Trib since 2005. She can be reached at rsignorini@triblive.com.