North Avondale : Development News

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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Everything But The House, an online personal property and estate sale service provider was founded in 2006. Although the business is based in Cincinnati, founders Brian Graves and Jacquie Denny haven’t stuck to those boundaries.

EBTH has an online sales platform, so buyers can be anywhere in the world and participate in local auctions. This month, EBTH opened two new locations, one in Lexington and the other in Fairfield County, Conn.

EBTH’s president and CEO Andy Nielsen and Jon Nielsen, partner and CBDO, took time to answer a few questions about the company’s recent expansion.
 
What prompted EBTH’s expansion to Lexington and Fairfield County, Conn.?
We’re really excited for 2013 and all of the growth that it will bring. In fact, we have plans to enter four to six new markets this year. 

Lexington was an easy choice for us because EBTH has grown organically into the state of Kentucky over the last few years. We have buyers and sellers in Lexington who have been loyal customers of EBTH in Cincinnati, so expanding to Lexington and opening a local office there just made sense. 

We take tremendous pride in the service we provide and we’re confident that EBTH will be embraced by cities cross the country. As such, we decided to expand our reach a bit further by opening in the state of Connecticut. Fairfield County is located about 45 minutes outside of New York City, has a dense (and thriving) housing market, and is home to some amazing antiques and collectibles.
 
Are either of the new locations open for business yet?
Yes, both locations are now open for business. The Lexington location opened Jan. 7 and the Connecticut location opened on Jan. 15. Our representatives in both locations are working on booking their first sales so please be sure to keep an eye on our website.
 
Will the new locations run like Cincinnati’s EBTH?
Each and every EBTH location will offer the same tremendous services, online personal property and estate sales. Whether you’re in a situation where you need to sell a large collection of personal property, including antiques, furniture, artwork, collectibles and more, EBTH is the solution to sell everything quickly, easily and profitably.
 
How do the new facilities compare in size to the Cincinnati location?
At onset, our new offices in Kentucky and Connecticut will be slightly smaller than our facilities here in Cincinnati, but with year-over-year growth that averages nearly 75 percent, we anticipate that our new locations will quickly scale to the size of our Cincinnati location.
 
Did founders Brian Graves or Jacquie Denny have a hand in the new EBTH locations?
Absolutely. As partners and original founders, Brian and Jacquie have been instrumental in our growth and they will have a hand in each and every new location that we open. The growth that we’ve experienced over the past five years has been extraordinary and we’re excited to carry that momentum into new cities across the country.
 
How did EBTH decide where to open new locations?
We have been blessed with tremendous ‘word of mouth’ marketing. Our customers are amazing, and as they’ve told their friends and families about the service that EBTH provides, we’ve been lucky to earn business from people across the country. 

Our growth into Kentucky was largely organic, and our decision to open in Connecticut was strategic, based on an effort to grow into a number of major metropolitan markets across the country in the coming 12-24 months.
 
How do you think EBTH’s expansion will help its current customers?
Our growth is great for everyone—buyers as well as sellers. As a buyer, our expansion into new locations means that you’ll have access to more sales and an increased variety of unique pieces from across the country. As a seller, it means that you’ll finally have one expert service provider that can handle the sale of your contents quickly, easily and profitably.
 
By Caitlin Koenig
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Brian Graves founded Everything But The House in 2006 as an online personal property and estate sale service provider that combines the traditional estate or tag sales, the essence of an auction and the exposure and convenience of the Internet. In essence, you can be anywhere in the world and participate in an auction in Cincinnati. (Or be in Cincinnati and participate in an online sale in Jackson Hole, Wyo,. facilitated by EBTH.)
 
In 2007, Graves invited his friend Jacquie Denny to join EBTH. Before joining EBTH, Denny was an entrepreneur and owner of a tag sale business. Like Graves, she attended auction school at Mendenhall School of Auctioneering in High Point, NC.
 
For the first 15 months, EBTH was a tag sale business, and buyers had to attend the sale at the various homes to purchase items for the listed, or negotiated, amount. EBTH would place photos of key items on its website to give buyers an idea of what kinds of items would be for sale. After one year in business, EBTH had an email database of about 800 regional customers.
 
Even though EBTH was delivering strong results to local clients through the tag sale business, Graves and Denny both thought they were leaving money on the table because of limited regional participation and sale accessibility. At that point, they incorporated the online sale platform into the EBTH website, and the company’s success grew.
 
“With the opportunity to reach an international audience, the convenience it afforded bidders to access items over the course of seven days, and the fact that in almost every case, 100 percent of a home’s contents were sold, online sales caused more conventional methods to pale in comparison,” says Brian Graves, founder of EBTH. Today, EBTH registers about 800 new bidders from around the world per month.
 
With the addition of online sales, EBTH facilitated about $7 million in total sales in 2012 and has grown to include 50 employees and sale coordinators. In the next few months, EBTH will be opening locations in Lexington and Fairfield County, Conn.
 
Graves spent most of his professional career working for a Fortune 500 company, where he held various positions in information technology, management and quality improvement. He became interested in the resale business when he bought a house built in the 19^th century and began to look for antique furnishings at local auctions.
 
For several years, he bought and sold antiques at local antique fairs, antique malls and fine art auctions, where he acquired a vast knowledge of all things old. The local antique industry began to see a downturn in the late ‘90s, so he decided to auction off most of his antiques and focus on buying and selling “hard-to-find” antiques on the Internet.
 
Today, EBTH holds 10 to 12 sales per month directly from a seller’s home, plus about eight sales per month from their warehouse/showroom/office space on Kieley Place. Items are grouped into sale categories, such as mid-century modern and contemporary art, sports memorabilia, and furnishings, décor and collectibles.
 
Over the years, EBTH has sold some interesting pieces, including a signed and numbered screen print by Andy Warhol, titled “Teddy Roosevelt” from the “Cowboys and Indians” series, 1986; a rare Tiffany and Co. stained glass panel; and a set of 19^th century dueling pistols. EBTH has also facilitated sales for local celebrities, including former Cincinnati Bengal & All-Pro running back Rudi Johnson, and the Shillito, Gruen, Emery, Procter and Sawyer families.
 
If you’re interested in buying something from EBTH sale, visit them online and start bidding (every bid begins at $1). You can also see the items in person at sale previews, which are listed online. If you’d like EBTH to facilitate your estate sale, contact them here.
 
By Caitlin Koenig
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On Nov. 8, Cincinnati Public Schools auctioned 13 school buildings and four land parcels, valued at more than $27 million, according to the county auditor's office. Eleven of the buildings sold, along with one piece of land. Bidding opened on Nov. 5 at $50,000; at the close of the auction, CPS made $3.5 million, which was more than enough to complete the district's Facilities Master Plan.
 
The FMP was part of a bond levy that was passed in spring 2003 that combined state and other funds for a $1 billion build-out of the district. In the next 18 months, every school currently in use by CPS will either have been renovated or rebuilt to create a better environment for students, faculty and staff.
 
As part of the FMP, many of the schools that were sold at auction were “swing” schools, which means they were used for classes while other schools were being renovated. After renovations, CPS no longer had a need for the schools, but wanted the buildings to have second lives.
 
“As part of the plan, we knew we couldn’t overbuild, and we didn’t want to under-build,” says Janet Walsh, director of public affairs for CPS. “The consequence of that was that there were some beautiful buildings that we weren’t able to use as school buildings, but could be used by the community in other ways.”

The district's approach, as it has been before, was to put the buildings up for auction.
 
CPS held a successful auction about three years ago, but this one included more buildings and raised more money than expected, says Eve Bolton, board president of CPS. Some of the schools that didn’t sell in the 2009 auction sold this time around.
 
“The reality is that the economic upturn in this region and the interest in Greater Cincinnati leaves a stock of historic, well-built schools empty,” says Bolton. “We want to see our buildings reused and recycled so that they can be beneficial to the neighborhoods they are a part of.”
 
State law allows CPS to auction off unused buildings, but only after they have first been offered to local charter schools. Those left after auction can be sold on the public market as pieces of real estate. Buyers have no legal restrictions regarding what the school buildings can be used as—some of the buildings will become other schools, residential housing or office buildings; others will be torn down and something else will be built in their places.
 
CPS schools and land included in the Nov. 8 auction:

• Burton Elementary School, 876 Glenwood Street, North Avondale: sold for $305,000; built in 1966, last class in 2008
• Central Fairmount Elementary School, 2475 White Street, South Fairmount: sold for $310,000; built in 1900, last class in 2012
• Heberle Elementary School, 2015 Freeman Avenue, West End: sold for $60,000; built in 1929, last class in 2007
• Hoffman Elementary School, 3060 Durrell Avenue, Evanston: sold for $200,000; built in 1922, last class in 2011
• Kirby Road Elementary School, 1710 Bruce Avenue, Northside: sold for $230,000; built in 1910, last class in 2005
• Lafayette Bloom Middle School, 1941 Baymiller Street, West End: sold for $60,000; built in 1915, last class in 2006
• Linwood Fundamental Academy, 4900 Eastern Avenue, Linwood: sold for $75,000; built in 1927-29, last class in 2005
• Losantiville Elementary School, 6701 Elbrook Avenue, Amberley Village: sold for $525,000; built in 1954, last class in 2008
• Old SCPA, 1310 Sycamore Street, Pendleton: sold for $1.3 million; built in 1910, last class in 2010
• Old Shroder Junior High School, 3500 Lumford Place, Kennedy Heights: sold for $150,000; built in 1956, last class unknown
• Paradrome Street parcel, Mount Adams: sold for $135,000
• Winton Montessori School, 4750 Winton Road, Winton Place: sold for $265,000; closed in early Nov. 2012
• George F. Sands School, 940 Poplar Street, West End: not sold, valued at $1.89 million; built in 1912, last class in 2007
• North Fairmount Elementary School, 2001 Baltimore Avenue, North Fairmount: not sold, valued at $2.2 million; built in 1954, last class unknown
• E. Apple Street parcel, Winton Hills: not sold, valued at $485,628
• Terry Street parcel, East Price Hill: not sold, valued at $13,400
• Site of old Millvale school building, 3277 Beekman Street, Millvale: not sold, valued at $135,550

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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Cincinnati residents looking to enhance the greenness of their green thumbs will soon have a new - and well-funded - resource. The Civic Garden Center of Greater Cincinnati, an Avondale-based nonprofit organization that provides horticultural education to individuals, students and community groups, is receiving substantial support for The Green Learning Station, its environmentally oriented education program.

While the Civic Garden Center has offered gardening courses to the community and supported more than 47 active gardens in the city, the Green Learning Station takes its educational programming in a new direction. The Station's courses, seminars and actual construction will provide both training and research opportunities for those interested in sustainability through horticulture.

The Ohio EPA likes the idea; it recently awarded the Civic Garden Center a $50,000 general grant to fund field trips - including supplies and bus fees - for 60 middle school and high school classes.

"It has been our hope to be able to provide this hands-on, real world field trip and curriculum free of charge, and to provide funds for students to actually make a change at their schools," says Ryan Mooney-Bullock, program manager for the Green Learning Station.

She explained that while the Station's courses on gardening, green roofs and rainwater harvesting have significant value for gardeners, the hope is that they could sprout a grassroots solution to one of Greater Cincinnati's larger environmental problems: uncontrolled rainwater runoff that overflows sewers and dumps pollution into the region's waterways.

"We have all this water running off. If we can plant more gardens and bioswales, we're not only creating beautiful spaces, we're solving the rainwater problem," she says.

This falls hand-in-hand with the goals of the Metropolitan Sewer District of Greater Cincinnati's Project Groundwork, a multi-year series of projects aimed at modernizing the area's runoff management system. In fact, the MSD is funding a series of sustainable control projects at the Green Learning Station. The efficacy of the projects will be measured, with the data made available to students and researchers investigating these green solutions to runoff problems.

Environmental quality organizations are not the only funders of this major educational initiative. The Greater Cincinnati Foundation is providing $50,000 to fund digital signage at the station, making its educational displays and information more accessible to the community.

"We funded the Green Learning Station not only because it is an innovative and collaborative project but it also gets the broader community involved in addressing the issue of storm water runoff," says LaToya Moore, associate program officer at the Greater Cincinnati Foundation.

The Green Learning Station's facility is under construction at the Civic Garden Center on Reading Road, with funding support from PNC Bank, Social Venture Partners and a growing list of local and regional foundations. If the support continues, Civic Garden Center officials say they hope to open the Green Learning Station, and begin spreading the knowledge that could support grassroots sustainability in Cincinnati, in April 2011.

Writer: Matt Cunningham
Photography by Scott Beseler.

Since June, visitors to the Cincinnati Zoo have had a unique, but non-animal, attraction to see: the zoo's new, 30-foot vertical-axis wind turbine, or VAWT.

The turbine, is the first such unit installed at a zoo, and produces an estimated 2000 kilowatts of energy per year - enough to run a typical dishwasher and refrigerator for a year, according to the Zoo.  The turbine and a series of solar panels are providing a third of the power needed to run the Zoo's ticketing building.

It's a nifty concept, and an aesthetically interesting one to boot: Rather than the propeller/windmill shape many have come to know as typical for wind turbines, the VAWT looks more like an elongated eggbeater blade, or some type of kinetic sculpture. Videos on the zoo's website show the aerodynamic blades turning slowly in this summer's light breezes, looking more like a child's mobile than an efficient generator.

And the videos show another side of the turbine, too. Comments on one, accessed through YouTube, harp on the zoo for spending a significant amount of money on a turbine that produces very little power (the actual cost of the turbine is not listed, but smaller residential units retail for roughly $4,000). In a sense, the comment has a point: why raise a turbine - in an area not known for consistent wind - that can only power a fraction of one building on a very large, very energy-costly campus? Is that really money well spent?

A little digging suggests two responses: first, it's not about electricity. Second, in that light it's money very well spent.

Visit the Zoo's website and peruse its medial information about the turbine, and it's clear that the installation is less about producing energy than it is about education. There are videos describing the vertical axis design, and showing it at work. There are pdf brochures and pages of information about residential use of wind generators and solar arrays. There is coverage of the Zoo's efforts to save polar bears, whose habitats are at risk due to global warming. And pages throughout the site feature the phrase "what can I do to go green?"

The Zoo's turbine is about education. It's a unique eye-catcher, and a touchstone for Zoo media staff to use when connecting visitors to its other, more action- and results-oriented sustainability efforts. The Greenest Zoo in America may not have the most powerful, cost-effective wind turbine on the planet, from a purely numbers standpoint, but taken in larger context, it's a valuable player in a larger effort to produce sustainable, environmentally friendly change in Cincinnati.

Writer: Matt Cunningham
Images pulled from Cincinnati Zoo video.