A new website designed to drive business growth and investment in Pennsylvania should help promote the area's available business properties, local economic development officials said.

The largest state-wide site selection network of its kind, PASiteSearch.com, which was recently launched by the state Department of Community and Economic Development and Team Pennsylvania Foundation, includes up-to-date community demographics, built-in social-media integration, Google Maps, labor and infrastructure assets, as well as workforce and expenditure reports for properties of interest. Geographic information system, or GIS, mapping technology is part of the website as well.

“The PASiteSearch launch is an excellent and unique asset not only for the state of Pennsylvania at large, but also for the Greater Reading area.  We hope that the user-friendly, one-stop shop approach will drive more interest and attention to our area” said Jon Scott, Berks Economic Partnership President.

According to GIS Planning Inc., the company that designed and built the system, PASiteSearch is the first website to integrate site selection information from Pennsylvania and the United States into a single, user-friendly site. PASiteSearch is integrated with ZoomProspector.com, which allow visitors worldwide to conduct a national search of communities and commercial properties that match specific criteria.

When a community or commercial property in Pennsylvania matches a business search on ZoomProspector, users can immediately click through to the new website to get the information that will help them analyze the unique business advantages offered by the Pennsylvania site.

This website launch is a significant tool that will benefit the ‘Sites and Infrastructure’ initiatives set forth by the Ride to Prosperity Report which includes Strategies for Economic Competitiveness in Greater Reading.  Eight collaborating Berks County organizations hope to develop one-300 acre site and two smaller sites between 10-50 acres by 2015.  This is in addition to increased support and marketing two important sites—Berks Park 78 and the Airport Research Park.

In developing PASiteSearch, DCED worked with local economic development partners like Berks Economic Partnership and Team Pennsylvania Foundation to ensure that the most critical site selection information would be available to users.

"This enhancement makes SiteSearch a unique, indispensable economic development tool and it gives Pennsylvania a major advantage over other states that are competing to retain, attract and expand business," said Rich Hudic, Team Pennsylvania president and CEO.