Avondale : Development News

On Friday, members of the Uptown community gathered for the Uptown Business Celebration, presented by Uptown Consortium and Uptown Rentals/North American Properties. Five Uptown organizations walked away with awards for business excellence and commitment to the community.
 
In order to be eligible for an award, businesses demonstrated strong commitment to the Uptown community, success in meeting the organization’s mission and sustainable businesses practices. They also encouraged others to follow their lead. Awards were given in five categories: Small Nonprofit of the Year (25 of fewer employees), Large Nonprofit of the Year (more than 25 employees), Community Champion, Small Business of the Year (50 or fewer employees) and Large Business of the Year (50 or more employees).
 
The Small Nonprofit award went to the Clifton Heights Community Urban Redevelopment Corporation and Large Nonprofit to Cincinnati Children’s Medical Center. Avondale resident and avid volunteer Patricia Milton won the Community Champion award; the Small Business award went to UC's DuBois Bookstore; and the Large Business award to Uptown Rental Properties.
 
Keynote speaker Benjamin Carson, Sr., M.D., overcame poverty and a rough childhood, and is currently a full professor of neurosurgery, oncology, plastic surgery and pediatrics at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. He has directed the pediatric neurosurgery program at Johns Hopkins Children’s Center for more than 25 years. Carson's many awards include 60 honorary doctorate degrees and the Presidential Medal of Freedom, which is the highest civilian honor.
 
Carson encouraged those at the awards ceremony to “elevate themselves” to make things better. He also shared his philosophy of success, which is “THINK BIG—talent, honesty, insight, nice, knowledge, book, in-depth learning and God.”
 
Uptown neighborhoods are Avondale, Clifton, Corryville, Clifton Heights, Fairview, University Heights and Mt. Auburn.
 
By Caitlin Koenig
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The City of Cincinnati has taken out the back-and-forth that can occur when residents try to reach them to report issues in their neighborhoods. At the Neighborhood Summit on Feb. 16, Vice Mayor Roxanne Qualls announced that the Cincinnati City Hall mobile app is available to the public.
 
With the app, residents can look up trash, recycling and street sweeping days, and set reminders; locate and report problems by address; bookmark locations for quick reporting; and track the status of reports. City Hall mobile also has GPS, so users can report issues, even without an address. There’s even a searchable map with property owner information, which enables residents to see if a property is occupied or vacant.
 
A few years ago, residents had to use the Yellow Pages to look up the number for city departments to file complaints, says Kevin Wright, executive director of Walnut Hills Redevelopment Foundation. The city then implemented a hotline for all complaints, but residents never knew the status of their reports.
 
“It’s amazing how comprehensive the app is,” Wright says. “If you see a broken window, pothole, graffiti, hanging gutter or anything else that is physically wrong with your neighborhood, street or community, you can report it in an instant. It’s a great tool for neighborhood redevelopment.”
 
The app can also be used as a community-organizing tool, Wright says. For example, if there is a property owner who historically hasn’t taken care of his or her property, social media can help organize a community and target the property to enforce codes until the property is fixed, which is what neighborhood councils and organizations like WHRF do.
 
“We’re really putting power in the hands of the citizens of the neighborhoods,” he says.
 
As with most tech programs, the app has room to grow, too. In the future, it could be linked with Facebook or Twitter, so your friends and followers will know who reported problems and where they are.
 
Cincinnati residents can download the app in the Apple App Store or download it through Google Play.
 
By Caitlin Koenig
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As many areas of Cincinnati are being rejuvenated, including OTR and Washington Park, the City of Cincinnati approved a comprehensive approach to focus on development in the city as a whole, not just targeted neighborhoods. 

Last Friday, the City Planning Commission approved and adopted Plan Cincinnati, which was designed with input from residents. The Plan is an opportunity to strengthen what people love about the city, what works and what needs more attention, says Katherine Keough-Jurs, senior city planner and project manager.
 
The idea is to re-urbanize suburbanized Cincinnati; in a sense, to return to the strengths of the city's beginnings. Cincinnati was established just after the American Revolution in 1788 and grew into an industrial center in the 19^th century. Many of those industries no longer exist in the city, which is part of why Cincinnati has become more suburbanized in the past 50 years. One of the long-term goals of the Plan is to bring new industries to Cincinnati.
 
With a new approach to revitalization, Cincinnati is blazing the trail for other cities. With a focus on building on existing strengths rather than tearing down structures and creating new ones, the Plan aims to capitalize on the city's “good bones” and good infrastructure.
 
Cinicinnatians had a huge role in developing the Plan. The first public meeting for the Plan was held in September 2009, when residents offered their insights into “what makes a great city?" and "what would make Cincinnati a great city?” A steering committee of 40 people representing businesses, nonprofits, community groups, local institutions, residents and City Council helped develop the Plan.

The Plan also got support from a grant from the Partnership for Sustainable Communities, which the City received in 2010. The grant allotted $2.4 million over three years to support the Land Development Code, which combines and simplifies Cincinnati's codes, reviews the development process, implements Form-based Codes and considers more creative uses for land. The grant allowed the city to start implementing some of the ideas voiced in public meetings.
 
Visionaries included youth, too. City staff worked with community centers and Cincinnati Public Schools to develop an art project for children. They were given clay pots and asked to paint their fears for the city on the inside and their dreams for the city on the outside. The children saw the big issue was quality of life, just like the adults did.
 
“It was an interesting way to get the kids involved and thinking about the future,” Keough-Jurs says.
 
The Plan aims to strengthen neighborhood centers—the neighborhoods’ business districts. It maps out areas that people need to get to on a daily basis and found that most are within about a half-mile of the business districts. But in some neighborhoods, residents can’t access their neighborhood centers. 

The accessibility of a neighborhood center is based on walkability—not just for pedestrians, but also about how structures address walking. For exampke, if a pedestrian can walk from one end of the neighborhood center to the other without breaking his or her pattern (the window shopping effect), the area is walkable; if he or she has been stopped by a parking lot or vacancies, it’s not walkable, Keough-Jurs says.
 
The neighborhood centers are classified in one of three ways in the Plan: maintain, evolve or transform. Some neighborhoods have goals to maintain levels of walkability, whereas others need to gradually change or evolve. Still others need to completely transform in order to strengthen their business districts.
 
“Cincinnati is at the heart of the region,” Keough-Jurs says. “If we strengthen Cincinnati, we strengthen a region.”

The next step for the Plan is to go before the Cincinnati City Council, specifically the Livable Communities Committee, which is chaired by Vice Mayor Roxanne Qualls.
 
By Caitlin Koenig
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Last Friday, a motion to reallocate three pieces of city-owned property for public use was approved by the City Planning Commission. The properties are at the intersection of Vine Street and Erkenbrecher Avenue, near the main entrance to the Cincinnati Zoo.
 
The properties are to be used to create better access to the zoo’s new entrance for both cars and pedestrians by widening the road, says Felix Bere, senior city planner for the City of Cincinnati. A wider road will also improve parking around the zoo. Plans for the three properties have been in the works since spring 2011.
 
By Caitlin Koenig
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The Local Initiatives Support Corporation (L ISC) of Greater Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky and the United Way of Greater Cincinnati have always had a close relationship. Now, they are neighbors.

LISC, the nonprofit community development group, moved into the United Way building at 2400 Reading Road, in Walnut Hills, in late April after calling the Emery Building, at 100 E. Central Parkway, home for the past five years.  

“We couldn’t really expand and do better neighborhood development work where we were,” says Kathy Schwab, LISC executive director. “This was perfect: It was newly renovated, the expense was really neutral and it was better space for us. Most importantly, it was more accessible for the funding community.’’

LISC is a national nonprofit group that fosters development in city neighborhoods through technical help and financial investments. Last year, they helped prevent local foreclosures, invested in housing for homeless veterans and helped open Gabriel’s Place, among a myriad of other projects to support health and safety, education and youth, economic development, housing development and improving family incomes.

In 2011, the group invested $2.7 million locally and leveraged $39.5 million. Since 2000, the nonprofit has invested $51.9 million and has leveraged $286.1 million. The staff works with local community development groups including the Cincinnati Development Fund and NeighborWorks.

Schwab and three other staff members packed themselves up and moved themselves into the building with the help of a local moving company. A new employee started last week in the new second-floor office. The full-time staff will be joined this summer by two interns and a VISTA AmeriCorps member to work with the group’s Financial Opportunity Centers and also with LISC’s AmeriCorps program.

Schwab said the move means she will be closer to other community development organizations in the city. She is also excited about the opportunity to collaborate with the United Way’s grant writer to win federal grants tied to community development.

“Greater Cincinnati has a great community development infrastructure,’’ Schwab says. “We already do collaborative projects … It will be so nice to be housed with the United Way . . .where we can share space and be supportive of others.”

By Chris Graves
Chris Graves is the assistant vice president of social and digital media at The Powers Agency, a public relations and advertising agency.

The Cincinnati Development Fund has been a financial resource for affordable housing development in the city's neighborhoods for 23 years. And that long track record of helping spur development -- and redevelopment -- in some of Cincinnati's underserved areas recently earned the CDF a $1.5 million federal grant to support its mission.

The grant comes from the U.S. Treasury's Community Development Financial Institutions Fund (CDFI). The CDFI awarded $142,302,667 to 155 community development financial institutions -- like CDF -- nationwide. CDF received $750,000 from the fund in 2010, making this year's award a very pleasant surprise, says CDF president and CEO Jeanne Golliher.

"We were really expecting something along the lines of what we got last year," she says.

The $1.5 million sum is the maximum any single organization could receive from the CDFI. Golliher credits CDF's long-standing role in the community as reason for the high award.

"We're really in touch," she says. "We know where the needs are."

A main focus of CDF's efforts, she explains, are smaller developers -- sometimes individual homeowners, sometimes development companies focusing on one or two buildings -- who wish to revitalize property in parts of the city suffering from high foreclosure and vacancy rates. The smaller developers fit a niche that complements larger development organizations, such as the Cincinnati Center City Development Corporation (3CDC), which is in the midst of redeveloping a large portion of Over-the-Rhine. Golliher refers to many of CDF's borrowers as "urban pioneers:" people willing to be early redevelopers in areas that have yet to see widespread revitalization.

"We've had so much activity with our small loan program," she says. "There are a lot of cases where people want to buy and fix up a building on their own, and they come to us."

Golliher says her team is in the process of planning how to best use the grant funds. Some of it may be used as matching funds for $3.3 million in low-interest funding CDF has requested from the U.S. Treasury to help fund small business development in the city.  She plans to present a proposal for how the funds will be used at CDF's August board meeting. In the meantime, she says she and her team are thrilled by this recent show of federal support.

"I think it speaks to our track record," she says.

By Matt Cunningham

Follow Matt on Twitter @cunningcontent

Residents of several Cincinnati neighborhoods gathered at Tuesday's meeting of the city's Public Safety Committee to vent frustration. Their concern is the pace of proposed reforms that would refine a city ordinance intended to root out crime and public nuisance hot spots.

Chapter 761 of the Cincinnati Municipal Code, better known as the chronic nuisance ordinance, gives the city authorization to impose fines and other penalties for landlords whose properties are the site of significantly-above-average numbers of police calls for service. Since its creation in 2006, the ordinance has endured a number of lawsuits over its constitutionality, and a city attempt to alter provisions of the law in 2009 met with pushback from citizens; it remains unchanged from its 2007 form. A council motion regarding potential changes to the law, filed at the end of 2010, called for a public hearing in response to public concern that the changes weakened the law.

That hearing was supposed to have taken place no later than January 2011. It has yet to be scheduled. And for a number of city residents, the matter is getting tiresome. The debate over the law's final form has the potential to weaken it too much, they say, and they expressed concern that the ordinance isn't being enforced in the meantime.

"I am so fed up and tired of having to come down here over the same issue, just to see that the ordinance is enforced," said North Avondale resident Michelle Baxter.

Westwood resident Chris Kearney agreed, and added that he sees the chronic nuisance ordinance as a key to healthy development in Cincinnati neighborhoods struggling with crime and blight.

"I believe the chronic nuisance ordinance is a part of solving our budget situation," he said. "People are losing confidence in our neighborhoods."

Council members Cecil Thomas and Charlie Winburn responded to the concerns.

"I agree that this should have been added to the agenda a lot sooner than now," said Thomas, who noted that part of the delay was due to changes in drafts of the revised law.

"The city administration has not really responded in the last seven to eight months," said Winburn. "I'm baffled at why this has taken so long."

But sorting out the problem became a convoluted matter as the meeting progressed. Winburn threatened to call a special session of council to address the issue if it didn't move forward. Thomas then noted that council was still waiting to receive one version of the draft resolution - from Winburn's office. The competing versions of the revision were on the subcommittee's agenda to be addressed, but could not be addressed, since they are still technically under revision and have not been finalized as drafts.

A back-and-forth discussion over draft resolutions, revisions and the timing of the issue ensued, and the subcommittee meeting ended without council being able to set a date for hearings on the chronic nuisance ordinance. Thomas expressed interest in moving forward in the next two weeks, but sounded doubtful council could address the issue before August.

Story: Matt Cunningham

A group of residents from several Cincinnati neighborhoods spoke at the June 7 meeting of Cincinnati City Council's Quality of Life Subcommittee. Their subject? A recently closed railroad spur and a proposal to change it into a 6.5-mile cycling and walking path.

"This could really serve as an important connector for the many [multiuse path] projects Cincinnati has going on," said project advocate Jay Andress.

The proposed project would convert a Norfolk Southern Railroad spur into a path that would connect with the Little Miami bike trail in Newtown and run into the heart of downtown. Advocates at Tuesday's meeting pointed out that the path would only cross seven roads in its entire length, making it a true rarity: a nearly uninterrupted trail running through several neighborhoods in a major urban area.

But beyond the health benefits and transportation options that the path could provide, some residents at the meeting brought up another point: building the path could resolve a growing problem with the semi-abandoned line.

Hyde Park Neighborhood Council President Anne Gerwin said the point where the line crosses Wasson Road has been a maintenance and safety issue for years. "We struggle many times each year to have the city and railroad maintain it," she said. The neighborhood's council passed a resolution supporting the project.

Likewise, Hyde Park resident Lindsay Felder, who said her home is within sight of the track, said there's been a visible deterioration of it - and an uptick in people loitering along the weedy path - since it became inactive in 2009.

"We've always wondered about the tracks," she said, explaining that she began going door to door to drum up local support after meeting Andress and learning about the proposed project.

"We see it as a great upcycling of existing property that is underutilized," she said.

Subcommittee chair Laure Quinlivan said there are a number of details to clarify before the project moves further forward, such as determining if Norfolk Southern has future plans for the line, and if an arrangement can be made that would allow the city to adapt the path into light rail if that becomes a future transit option.

"This is really a great proposal," she said. "The best ideas don't always come out of City Hall. If we could make this happen, it would be such a great asset to so many residents."

Story: Matt Cunningham
Photo: Wasson Way Project

It's hard to imagine getting excited about parking lot solar panels and elephant manure.

But prepare for the improbable when the Cincinnati Chapter of the US Green Building Council brings the conference "Breaking New Ground: Greening the Heartland" to the city June 22-24, 2011. LEED-accredited professionals and leaders from across the Midwest will join those here to learn the latest, best practices in sustainable building and tour innovative centers like the University of Cincinnati, Melink Corporation, and the Cincinnati Zoo to see those practices in action, including the collection of manure for organic waste composting.

With more LEED projects than anywhere else in Ohio and the fourth largest number of LEED accredited professional in the Midwest, Cincinnati is a national hub of sustainable building practices. The Cincinnati Chapter was selected to host the conference this year from a competitive crowd of sixteen chapters in the twelve-state Heartland region of the US Green Building Council.

"When we were competing to receive the conference, we stated our case on how we were evolving sustainably as a region by sharing our good news," recollects Chad Edwards, past president of the board and chair of the conference committee.

One outstanding success is the city's green school program. Cincinnati has the largest number of LEED-registered schools in the state, and Ohio has more of these schools than the states of California, Florida, Washington and Oregon combined. When members of the local chapter go to national events, they are recognized for having over 20% of all the LEED-registered schools in the country.

"We're treated like rock stars!" Edwards laughs. People want to know what the region is doing to foster this success. "It's collaboration," says Edwards. "It's people coming together. What we're not doing well is sharing our stories outside our region, and this conference will help with that."

Keynote speakers are LEED professionals and leaders from around the country and close to home. Procter & Gamble Company executive and Global Supply Officer, R. Keith Harrison, Jr., will discuss the business aspects of sustainability and what P&G's past actions and current commitment to sustainability will mean for development in the region and businesses here.

Local LEED accredited professionals will appreciate the opportunity for continuing education credits that the conference will offer. Over a 1000 professionals are expected to attend the conference and its programs and visit the exhibition hall, where Cincinnati and Midwest businesses will display their sustainable building products and services.

Says Edwards, "Quite frankly, we're one of the top sustainable cities in the country," and this conference should spread the word.

Registration is open online.

Writer: Becky Johnson

The Uptown Consortium is working with a local recycling and job training program to demolish a building at 3500 Burnet in Avondale and make way for a new mixed use project that will play a key role in the group's master plan to revitalize Burnet Avenue in Avondale.

This past weekend the Partnership for Green Building worked to remove decorative sandstone features, fans and other fixtures from the building at 3500 Burnet. The brick and concrete will be ground up and used for gravel and underlay, and the wood will be shredded and composted. Lisa Doxsee, communications manager for Building Value, said that up to 90 percent of the mass of the building would be recycled or repurposed during the project.

The Uptown Consortium is currently working with two developers on potential development plans for a mixed use building on the site, and the developers will be encouraged to aim for LEED certification, Uptown's executive director Beth Robinson said.

The building was purchased by the Uptown Consortium three years ago during an $11 million campaign to purchase land and buildings on or near Burnet Ave, with the intent of attracting new development to the area. Other projects built on that land include a new medical center and parking garage for Children's hospital and a low income housing project built by Model Group.

"We've redeveloped a lot of the street and now [3500 Burnet] is a major corner, a major site that's really underutilized." Robinson said. "We're trying to get some commercial activity on Burnet and that's a logical site for it."

She said working with the Partnership will help them achieve two of their goals, to be more sustainable and provide better employment opportunities for residents of the Uptown neighborhoods.

Building Value, ACT Recycling and Rumpke Recycling created A Partnership for Greener Building about two years ago as an extension of job training programs Building Value had already implemented. In the partnership, Building Value trains unemployed or underemployed residents to deconstruct buildings and salvage usable materials like lumber and fixtures to be sold in Building Value's retail store. Rumpke and ACT recycle the materials that can't be salvaged.

Most of the program's graduates receive employment upon graduation, and any building constructed on the site can earn points toward LEED certification.

Writer: Henry Sweets

The Cincinnati Zoo enhances its "green" reputation by installing a solar canopy system over the parking lot. After a long and dedicated process of zoning, financial, and political issues, the installation will be completed by April. This addition not only helps the Zoo maintain its national reputation as a "green" leader, but it will also educate visitors about green technology.

"Since we are the greenest zoo in the country, we keep pushing the envelope to maintain this status," Mark Fisher, the Director of Zoo Facilities said. "We are always asking what to do next and it will be hard to top this one."

The Zoo collaborated with Milford, Ohio based Melink Corporation, a local leader in energy efficiency and energy renewable solutions, to install and maintain the solar canopy for seven years. At the conclusion of the $1 million contract, the Zoo has the option to buy the project.

"For the Zoo it's a win-win situation, that's why it is attractive for the Zoo to install it," Fisher said.

The solar canopy will utilize 6,400 panels that will cover 800 spots in one of the Zoo's parking lots. Once completed the canopy will provide 20% of the Zoo's energy needs. It will also educate visitors about green technology, using interactive kiosks to show how and why green technology works.

"People have the wrong perception that if you don't live in the areas like the West, solar power will not work," Fisher explained. "But this will show that it can work in a city like Cincinnati."

Fisher said word is traveling fast with other zoos contacting Cincinnati to learn more about the canopy.

"We just want to push the issue. We're using our house power to elevate the issue of using green technology," Fisher said.

The project will employ dozens of local workers and provide visitors the opportunity to have a hands-on experience with this one and only unique urban environment project.

"Nothing has been done like this in the history of the city and people are already looking for the next project." Fisher said.

Writer: Lisa Ensminger