Meeting brings consultants, residents together to discuss revitalization plans for R.I. neighborhoods.
About 40 to 50 people Wednesday night heard consultants' ideas about improving Rock Island's Old Chicago and Douglas Park neighborhoods with parks, enhanced roads and housing developments.Hmmm. Kind of easy to have such a breezy attitude when you own 18 rental properties, and taking the good with the bad means that you'll make a lot more money.
Three employees from Planning and Design Institute Inc. (PDI), of Milwaukee, Wis., presented ideas on how to improve the Old Chicago neighborhood and the northern part of the Douglas Park neighborhood. Illinois 92, 12th Street and 12th Avenue border the triangle-shaped area, said Brian Peterson, a principal with the company.
If companies build more expensive houses in Old Chicago, residents living around those houses may be driven out by rising property tax assessments, said Charles Swift of Rock Island. Mr. Swift does not live in the area in question, but said his relatives live in Old Chicago.
Revitalizing neighborhoods does increase property taxes, Lawrence Witzling, a PDI principal, admitted. There needs to be a proactive effort to provide financial help to people who need it, he said.
The proposed plans would cost millions and take years to complete, Mr. Carmen said.
While some are concerned with property taxes, Sheila Rind, an Old Chicago resident, said she thinks the plans are absolutely great. "You have to take the good with the bad," she said about any possibility of property tax increases. Mrs. Rind and her husband own 18 rental properties -- most of them in Old Chicago.
Any opinions on the pros and cons of such efforts to improve older neighborhoods?
posted by The Inside Dope @ 11/17/2005
6 comments
6 Comments:
Are you kidding me? Any improvement at all would be welcome -- though maybe a matter of throwing good money after bad. All in all, you have to give Rock Island credit for addressing the issue of housing blight and coming up with grant money and other moves, like this, to turn things around. Even if you don't philosophically agree with the taxpayers giving some lawyer a grant to fix the porch on his elegant Broadway District home (a made-up example, but one rooted in past practice). At least they haven't given up. If the neighborhood improves and property taxes go up, so what? That's like complaining that somebody gave you a car and now you have to buy gas.
People who own rental units pay more than their fair share of property taxes because rental properties are not eligible for owner-occupied exemptions ($5,000 in EAV) or over 65 exemptions (another $5,000 in EAV) or the Senior Citizen's property tax freeze. Most rental properties, especially in low-income areas, do not pay for themselves unless the mortgage is paid off. Public investment must be used to revitalize areas where the private sector has lost interest because property values do not justify private sector investment.
Thanks for that insight anon. But the fact remains that rental properties which bring in monthly income are a heck of a lot better investment than trying to make the nut on your own. Individual homeowners who bought older homes in these areas because they were affordable shouldn't be chased out by well-meaning revitalization which then pushes them out of the neighborhood. There's something in that equation that doesn't seem just.
Also, the quoted person owns an very large amount of rental properties by any standard. it sounds like they own a substantial hunk of the entire neighborhood.
There's a difference between affordable and blighted. Too many living units in low income neighborhoods are not fit for habitation. Blight must be addressed at the front end of any neighbohood revitalization effort through either rehabilitation or demolition. The issue of neighborhood revitalization and its impact on property values is a double-edged sword. If a neighborhood continues to decline, property values decline. This is certainly not in the best interest of any property owner including those of "affordable" properties. I don't think anyone is expecting the northwest corner of R.I. to become a neighborhood of million dollar homes, but how about a safe neighborhood free of blighted and vacant properties with homes and apartments in a moderate income range with some income-eligible units for both owners and renters? and how about a little convenient retail thrown in? Some greenspace and sidewalks?
As a Realtor, I am totally interested in not only a good quality of housing stock, but more important are the people who are able to afford the mortgage and upkeep on their homes.
Yes, the plan is good but lacks the impetus of those that are interested in being involved in bringing the ideas and bricks and morter to the commumitiy. The consultants stated that they don't bring that, they bring the ideas......Is this anohter plan that will sit on the shelves of City Hall like the 11th Street Task Force that I chaired?
David Levin
Thanks all, for your interesting comments, and welcome to the blog.
I've posted another item on neighborhood re-development above and invite your further comments. Perhaps it might serve as a base of discussion for these issues.
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