Two Jim Thorpe Zoning Hearing Board actions Monday night paved the way for a new wine shop in the Heights and a county archives office on the east side of town.

Anthony and Denise Sebelin, who own the former Carbon County Friends of Animals property along Walnut Street, received a variance to change the use of the property to a wine shop.The site will become a sixth location for the Ulster-based Antler Ridge Winery."We're very pleased to be moving forward," Denise said on Tuesday afternoon. "We've renovated the building after the Friends of Animals left in December, and that included putting up new drywall. Antler Ridge liked the idea of having a location in Jim Thorpe, and everything fell into place."Antler Ridge has a vast selection of wine and the site will be home to a gift shop and wine tasting area.Owner Steve Unis said he hopes the site will be operational within the next two or three months."Jim Thorpe is a beautiful town and we're very excited to be coming there," Unis said. "We have three locations north of Jim Thorpe and two to the south, so this is a great spot for us. In the past, we've had a lot of customers from the Jim Thorpe area tell us they wish we were closer because they have to drive an hour and a half to one of our stores. Now we'll be right in the backyard."In addition to selling wine, Unis said Antler Ridge makes it a priority to cater to customers interested in making wine at home."We'll work with them and give them tips in addition to selling the supplies they need to make their own wine," he said.Customers can expect different events such as "Meet the Winemaker night" or one of Antler Ridge's famous cookouts."We are also a licensed caterer so we'll bring our barbecue unit on site and cook pork, chicken and beef," Unis said. "We usually find something to hit everyone's palate."Denise said the next hurdle to cross is construction of a pole building in the rear of the property where Antler Ridge will store its inventory.For more information and to stay up to date on the potential opening of the Jim Thorpe location, visit

www.antlerridgewinery.com.County archivesCarbon County is one step closer to having a new site to store its vast collection of archival materials.Jim Thorpe's zoning board granted the county a variance Monday that will allow it to move its archives department to a building it purchased at 15 W. Fourth St.The county needed the variance because the property didn't have the amount of parking spaces required by the borough zoning ordinance for the intended use.William O'Gurek, county commissioner; Nancy Davidovich, count archives manager; and Mike Tirpak, of Carbon Engineering Inc., testified on behalf of the county Monday.According to O'Gurek, the building at 44 Susquehanna St. that currently houses the county archives and maintenance department is deteriorating."We purchased a former novelty shop owned by Mark Rimsky and we're going to fix it up and turn it into a nice space for our archives department," he said. "The department has three to four employees, some full-time and some part-time. A large percentage of the new building will be devoted to storage. We're making history every day and you need a place to store those very important records."While the archives department doesn't get a huge amount of foot traffic, residents do use it for things like genealogy research and title searches.The county hopes the transition is complete by the fall of 2016."Our plan is also to move the maintenance department out of the Susquehanna Street building," O'Gurek said. "We have looked at a long-term plan of putting a pole building in the vicinity of the existing Route 903 bridge after it is torn down. That building would then house our maintenance department."The future of the Susquehanna Street property is up in the air, but O'Gurek made it clear the county is not looking to sell it."We're going to demolish it but then we could put up something new and alleviate some of the overcrowding in the courthouse or use the space for parking," he said.