[naviga:h3]Cheer [/naviga:h3]

Jackson Township officials must be excited about a proposed new training facility for steamfitters to be built in the township.

Representatives from the Pittsburgh-based Steamfitters Local 449 unveiled plans last week during a meeting of the township’s planning commission.

They propose construction on a site along Wise Road between Mercer Road and Route 19, near Zelienople.

Dale Glavin, Steamfitters director of training, and architectural designer Tony Pitassi said the location fits the recent consolidation of Steamfitters local unions in Pittsburgh and Erie.

Glavin said the union aims to train only Pennsylvanians, but that doesn’t meant the apprentice school won’t be showpiece.

“These are great occupations,” said Glavin. “This building is going to be state-of-the-art. We’re hoping it’s a showcase throughout the country for how you train pipe fitters.”

The property developer, Don Rodgers, said he already received a $3 million grant from the state for highway improvements related to the new structure. Roads around the site need to be widened and elevated, and intersections will need to be improved. Sidewalks are being proposed for Wise and Mercer roads, pending PennDOT approval.

It’s an exciting proposal. The planning commission must be thorough in its review, and give every consideration to concerns including the site’s proximity to the Connoquenessing Creek flood plain and, across the creek, Historic Harmony.

Assuming those concerns can be addressed and mitigated, the project will be a big development for Jackson Township, and for Butler County.

[naviga:h3]Jeer [/naviga:h3]

Criminal suspects can say the darndest things.

When Butler Township police arrested three-time drug felon Jaraye L. Sloan, 35, and Quayshawn M. Sloan, 23, on felony narcotics and weapons charges, the Pittsburgh cousins insisted the driver of the car they were riding in was only giving them a ride — and that she knew nothing about any “illegal activity,” according to a police affidavit.

That’s got to be a stretch.

Police said they stopped the vehicle about 1:35 a.m. Thursday on Route 8 near the Pickle Gate Crossing. The driver, an unnamed 19-year-old woman, nearly caused a collision with a patrolman’s car when she changed lanes.

The driver acted “very suspiciously,” Patrolman Max Wittlinger testified in a court document.

Suspiciously, as if maybe she did know there might be dozens of bags of suspected heroin, crack cocaine, marijuana and a loaded pistol, along with two convicted felons, were in her car.

Even before they searched the vehicle, police spotted a marijuana baggie wedged between the front passenger seat and door and several marijuana roaches in the front passenger door handle.

Hidden throughout the car were a .32-caliber Ruger pistol with a round in the chamber; 70 stamp bags of heroin, baggies containing crack and marijuana; a scale; 44 rounds of .32-caliber bullets; and an open box of baking soda, commonly used to dilute cocaine.

But the defendants said the driver didn’t know. She wasn’t charged — not this time.

She apparently also doesn’t know the old idiom: Lie down with dogs, stand up with fleas.

[naviga:h3]Cheer [/naviga:h3]

Cheers to our neighbors to the west. Ohio voters saw through the flaws in a $20 million campaign to legalize recreational and medical marijuana. They rejected it, 64 percent to 35 percent.

Issue 3’s biggest problem was that it would have granted a near-monopoly to 10 pre-selected locations for commercial production of a marijuana crop.

The provision would have been written into the state constitution. And it’s no coincidence that the properties are owned by the investors who put up the money to promote Issue 3.

Even conventional pro-marijuana groups and individuals vehemently opposed this big-money attempt to establish a constitutionally protected cartel.

And that silly mascot, Buddy — a green cartoon character with a head shaped like a marijuana bud — simply failed to connect.

Intended as a campy, eccentric emblem for college students past and present, Buddy wasn’t so appealing as he was creepy. Many saw Buddy as akin to Joe Camel: an attempt to market grown-up products to kids who can’t wait to act grown up.

Ohioans didn’t buy any of it. Good for them.