Why Etna went green: 'The community needed to fight back,' borough manager Ramage says

Etna borough manager Mary Ellen Ramage can rattle off the names of five elderly widows who brought chocolates to office staff when they paid their water bills.

That was when Ramage was a receptionist some 45 years ago.

The borough, along with other government officials, honored Ramage recently for her almost half-century tenure and for winning a Carnegie Science Award as a Champion of Sustainability.

Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald was among the government officials honoring Ramage for her work.

“Etna, like many river towns, faces flooding challenges as a full third of the borough lies in a flood plain, making Etna, as the running joke goes, Wetna,” Fitzgerald wrote in a proclamation. “Mary Ellen moved her entire community to a conversation on sustainability, addressing stormwater and flooding along the way.”

Although the women bearing chocolates at the Etna borough offices are long gone, their generosity still inspires Ramage, who went on to advocate for residents and a new Etna.

While she met “so many wonderful people” when she was a fledgling borough employee, Ramage also saw the problems.

A partially deaf woman named Edna hooked Ramage into public life when she called borough offices more than 40 years ago. The woman yelled on the phone about a road crew plowing snow into a window well that would flood her basement apartment.

Ramage was told by the road crew and a town official, “Oh, honey, we can’t help with that.”

The woman’s plight and lack of a quick remedy bothered the then-17-year-old Ramage. During her lunch break, Ramage visited the woman and was shocked.

“She was 90% blind, and she had the burners turned on her stove for heat,” Ramage said. “Oh, my God, she was the first person that I knew that somebody had to speak up for.”

The entire borough’s struggles were real to Ramage, a lifelong resident who remembers the thousands of people celebrating the borough’s 1968 centennial.

However, the town hemorrhaged residents and businesses for decades after the mills diminished. Etna’s population peaked around 1930 with more than double the 3,336 residents counted in 2020 by the U.S. Census.

Through the work of borough council and Ramage, the population slump has been tapering off in recent years, according to the census.

“What really pushed down Etna decades ago was outside of our control,” Ramage said.

For example, PennDOT’s work on Route 28 over the years and the construction of the Etna bypass took about 400 homes, she said. Now, Etna has sewer lines that sit 52 feet below Route 28.

“We didn’t build over top of them,” she said.

Additionally, robust residential and commercial development in upstream communities unleashed more stormwater, which increased Etna’s vulnerability to flooding.

“Etna seemed like a forgotten and used place,” Ramage said, ravaged by progress in the region and surrounding communities and flooding. “It’s as if the people didn’t matter at all. What happened wasn’t equitable. The community needed to fight back in a responsible way.”

Etna needed to control its destiny by going green and improving its environment — installing green streetscape and infrastructure for sustainable drainage coupled with redevelopment. Etna’s awarding-winning EcoDistrict projects boosted the town’s natural drainage, along with whimsical sidewalks embedded with ribbons of decorative drainage grates.

“The beauty is really underground,” Ramage noted.

Once the town started making improvements to its sewers, spending millions for flood protection, “you can see how the quality of life changed,” Ramage said.

Young families and new businesses have been moving into the borough in recent years.

“They hear we are environmentally friendly, and new businesses are coming for the environmental practices. Everyone sees how good the main street looks,” she said.

One of Ramage’s recent achievements was the development of the Etna Riverfront Trail and Park. She and the borough won two Governor’s Awards for Environmental Excellence from the Pennsylvania Environmental Council for the riverfront park and the Etna EcoDistrict.

“Her legacy will be the borough’s pivot toward green infrastructure and stormwater management projects,” the Etna Community Organization said in a recent article on Ramage’s work.

Ramage was stunned to learn she won a Carnegie Science Award for shepherding the town’s environmental sustainability. She thought she received the email by mistake because she didn’t know anyone nominated her.

Millvale borough officials penned a proclamation honoring Ramage’s work developing a comprehensive EcoDistrict plan with Millvale and Sharpsburg, leading to Etna being certified as the first EcoDistrict in the country. EcoDistricts use environmentally friendly practices and sustainable community development.

“Mary Ellen Ramage is just one crazy and wonderful person that makes you think, laugh and cry all the while creating a thriving safer borough for all citizens to enjoy,” Millvale officials said in the proclamation.

Kelsey Ripper, executive director of Friends of the Riverfront, which develops trails along the rivers in Allegheny County, said, “If there is an initiative involving water, trees or trails, Mary Ellen is there, not just as a participant, but a leader. She is a tireless and passionate advocate for improving the quality of our communities.”

Ramage knows that the environmental changes in Etna as well as in Millvale and Sharpsburg have put the towns back on the map.

“Years ago when you said ‘river town,’ you might as well said ‘river rat,’ ” Ramage said. “Now, a river town is cool. It’s very wonderful to be here and be a part of it.”