A push to ignite McKees Rocks
The former industrial town looks to a few, earnest entrepreneurs to help transform its economy and its future
As snow approached on the first evening of spring, a roomful of people who aim to invigorate the struggling borough of McKees Rocks huddled over pizza, hoagies and salad in a cozy meeting space along the town’s main drag.
Many of them didn’t know each other before the kickoff session for Launch Sto-Rox, an incubator project meant to guide members in bringing their businesses and nonprofit initiatives to fruition over the next year.
By the time they finished their meals, they had gained insights into how they all landed on a path to entrepreneurship in a neighborhood long marked by high unemployment, poverty and crime.
Denise Zellous, a former drug addict who’s been clean for 18 years, said her Zellous Hope Project should help low-income men who face barriers to seeking and holding jobs.
Quaishawn Whitlock wants to operate a design and printing shop, Teen Studio Sto-Rox T. Youths could go there after school, building leadership skills and staying off the streets.
Caitlin Spitzer, editor at Gazette 2.0, wants to grow the fledgling community publication into a voice for local news after the town’s 125-year-old Suburban Gazette closed abruptly last year.
It was just the first meeting, but Scott Wolovich, executive director of the New Sun Rising nonprofit backing the incubator, was already teaching. The first lesson was advising the incubator participants on talking to potential investors and customers:
“Be concise and short,” he said. “If you don’t have people in the first 10 seconds, they’re lost.”
Launch Sto-Rox is the latest New Sun Rising project in a series of incubators that target lowincome, distressed communities such as Sto-Rox — a former industrial center four miles west of Downtown Pittsburgh that includes Stowe and McKees Rocks.
New Sun Rising’s mission is to help revitalize underserved neighborhoods by assisting entrepreneurs who have a social mission. It has launched incubators in Wilkinsburg, Millvale, the North Side and the city’s Hill top Allentown neighborhood.
Projects that emerged from its Millvale incubator include commercial food businesses like Tupelo Honey Teas Cafe, which opened in 2016 adjacent to the town’s library.
In the Hilltop area that includes Allentown, Beltzhoover and Knoxville, the incubator helped launch Academy Pittsburgh, a web development program that asks its coding boot camp students to give back to the community through service projects.
Founded in 2005 to promote community building and economic development, New Sun Rising has an annual budget of just over $1 million.
Unlike many business incubators sponsored by private companies or universities, New Sun Rising typically doesn’t start with a