Survival Guide: Ewing’s State? Good for Business

Ewing Township has become a hot spot in Central Jersey for economic growth and development. In the past 12 months, the township approved a redevelopment plan for residental, retail, and office space at the site of the former General Motors plant on Parkway Avenue, saw a successful new airline open at the Trenton-Mercer Airport, welcomed Church & Dwight to its new 250,000-square-foot world headquarters in the Princeton South Corporate Center, and initiated plans for a campus town development near the College of New Jersey.

The man leading the township through this period of growth is Mayor Bert Steinmann. Steinmann was born in the Netherlands, but grew up in Ewing. A  retired union member and pension manager of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Steinmann was a long-time councilman before being elected mayor in 2010. The mayor has made redevelopment and economic growth a priority of his administration.

Steinmann will deliver his annual “State of the Township” address to the MIDJersey Chamber of Commerce on Wednesday, April 16, at 11:30 a.m. at the Mountain View Golf Club. Phone 609-689-9960 or visit www.midjerseychamber.org.

As Steinmann noted in a recent interview with the Ewing Observer (one of U.S. 1’s sister publications), his approach is to be business friendly. “If you come to us with a viable plan that we believe strongly in and works for the town, we will absolutely work for you, and we’ll move any mountain that we possibly have to move, including talking to state officials. I don’t care how long it takes me.”

“I think my relationships with those individuals in those different [state] departments are really critical and they really work well. I think they share the same vision, not only for Ewing Township, but for the whole area.”

Steinmann believes that the success of Frontier Airlines at the airport is “going to be a home run for Ewing Township, because businesses are looking to relocate especially those that rely heavily on air traffic.”

The new Capital Health hospital just across I-95 in Hopewell Township is another catalyst. “There are two proposed office complexes just for that on Scotch Road where the Element and the Courtyard by Marriott are. They’re putting up two 286,000 square foot condo buildings for doctors’ offices.”

Ewing’s recent inclusion in the list of towns that make up “einstein’s Alley” did not surprise Steinmann. “Just to be even thought about in that vein is good, and rightly so. We have testing labs here, we have FMC, Church & Dwight, Computer Associates. It highlights all of the opportunities that Ewing Township presents to people. In fact,” he says with a laugh, “we even have a brewing company here [River Horse]. That requires chemistry, right?”