Burns: JRA $1.9 million grant bungling needs further explanation
‘A community like ours simply cannot afford these kind of mistakes’
Rep. Frank Burns September 18, 2025 | 10:15 AM
JOHNSTOWN, Sept. 18 – Saying the community cannot afford such massive and unprecedented bungling of federal grant money, state Rep. Frank Burns wants the Johnstown Redevelopment Authority executive director to provide more details on why it had to return $1.9 million awarded to renovate the Cambria Rowe Building.
Burns, D-Cambria, said he cannot fathom why the JRA could not spend the money after more than five years, causing its return – even after Burns secured an additional $200,000 in state funding last fall to remove asbestos and install new windows so the project could move forward.
Burns said he was never approached by anyone at the JRA about the project, and only acted after being contacted by Dr. George Frem and the late Rev. Monsignor Raymond Balta to remove the last obstacle blocking Frem’s plan to convert the unused building into the city’s first and only urgent care facility. It was be called the Ave Maria Medical Care Center.
“A community like ours simply cannot afford to have these kinds of mistakes,” Burns said. “It’s hard enough to get these grants, let alone see the money returned because it couldn’t be spent in time – especially when the time you had to spend it exceeded five years.”
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“It’s hard enough to get these grants, let alone see the money returned because it couldn’t be spent in time – especially when the time you had to spend it exceeded five years.” – State Rep. Frank Burns
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Burns zeroed in on comments made by JRA Executive Director Mark Critz, who in a news story said “there were lots of issues” that worked to derail the project and “lots of mistakes along the way from lots of parties.” Critz also said it was a “convoluted story” that was “hard to describe in a couple sentences.”
“That explanation’s not good enough,” Burns said. “Mark Critz needs to tell us precisely what these mistakes were and who made them. The public deserves to know who is responsible for the JRA losing out on $1.9 million, so it won’t happen again. And so people won’t question whether this was done politically or intentionally.”
Burns said it is nothing short of tragic that Critz is saying “it got to the point where the money just expired,” especially since an additional state grant of $1.9 million in matching funds for the project is now in limbo.
“Apparently asbestos removal at a cost of $200,000 was blocking a $3.8 million urgent care center and 150 potential jobs in the city? So I stepped up and got the extra $200,000 for asbestos remediation, but in reality, I think that was just an excuse they were putting up so they didn’t have to do this project,” Burns said. “I got the JRA that money, but they still didn’t get the job done in time. That really pisses me off. I believe they were just playing games all along.”
Now that the JRA has voted to give the money back, Burns said he thinks a good source for replacement funds is the nonprofit 1889 Foundation, which has a $140 million kitty from the sale of Conemaugh Hospital and whose mission statement is to provide grants for “transformative work that improves the health of people” in Cambria County. The 1889 Foundation could save this project to create an urgent care center that would provide greater access to care, improve health outcomes for patients, and produce 150 jobs in the city.
“The foundation’s money is the community’s money from the sale of the hospital. That’s supposed to be used for the health and wellness of the community,” Burns said. “What could be better than using some of it to have the first and only critical care facility in the city?”