WASHINGTON, Pa. (KDKA) -- Jerry Sandusky grew up in Washington County, and his hometown has been getting a lot of attention since the sex abuse scandal broke.

Now, a recent report in a national newspaper has struck a nerve with people there.

"We're ready to rock 'n roll here today," shouts a chef at the Dog House Diner in Washington, Pa., preparing an order of ham & eggs.

It was business as usual at the popular diner, featured in a national news story about how locals were feeling hurt that Sandusky was a native son.

Today, patrons disputed that notion. "All the communities are good communities, good people. Things like that happen. We have no control over it," says Jack Tommasin of Eighty-Four.

The suggestion that people in Washington County were depressed over Sandusky was reported in USAToday.

JR Shaw read from the paper.

"An air of melancholy of the unremitting sadness of it all hangs thick," he read.

"You don't believe that?" KDKA Money Editor Jon Delano asked him.

"Hyperbole," Shaw said.

Shaw heads the Washington County Tourism Promotion Agency, and he thinks some in the national media are exaggerating the impact of Sandusky on the community.

"The county is doing well from an economic development standpoint, and the positive things that are going on around here from the housing and employment market," notes Shaw. "Certainly this is an awful, awful case all the way around, but I don't see an air of melancholy about this."

But there's no mistaking Sandusky's roots here.

The Sandusky name is well-knownin Little Washington. Jerry Sandusky's father, Art, started the Brownson House, a popular recreation area for local youth.

Keri Ganster of Washington waits tables at the Dog House Diner and she doesn't think people are obsessing over Sandusky.

Delano: "Do people talk a lot about the Sandusky case?"

Ganster: "No, I haven't heard it -- not around here anyway."

Other patrons agree it's just not a topic that hits their hometown more than others.

"Not in my area, where I work and stuff, not really," says Dana Matyjasek, a life-long resident of Washington. "I just watch the news and read in the paper."

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LINK: Pennsylvania Attorney General's Office
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