NEWS

Mayor Hall joins DeWine to discuss demolition program

Kent Mallett
Reporter

NEWARK – The city demolished 57 residential eyesores since 2012 with state grant funds and has enough money remaining to rid the city of one more dilapidated structure.

The vacant, two-story pink brick house at 191 Hudson Ave. will become victim No. 58, not from the grant money but using administration fees Newark collected to administer the state's demolition program to all of Licking County.

"It's very dangerous," Hall said of the Hudson Avenue house. "I was through the house a couple years ago. That pink house, since Day 1, it's been on our radar."

Mayor Jeff Hall discussed the city's use of state demolition grant program funds at a Columbus news conference with Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine and Cleveland City Councilman Anthony Brancatelli.

The state program, which started in Newark in 2012, used $75 million from the National Mortgage Settlement to fund demolition of blighted and abandoned structures across Ohio. The program concluded in December.

Newark administered the program for more than 90 demolitions in Licking County, including Heath, Johnstown, Buckeye Lake, Utica, Pataskala and the Licking County government for the unincorporated areas.

Hudson Avenue residents were pleased to hear the pink house with the familiar "X" on the front will be leveled.

"I think it's a good idea because kids are probably getting in there and trying to catch it on fire," Hudson Avenue resident Elizabeth Shaw said. "It's unsafe."

Megan Barrick, also of Hudson Avenue, said, "I've seen people going in and out, probably up to no good."

Hall said the grant money was a godsend for Newark, as city officials began making a list of rundown properties, knowing they did not have the funds to tear down many. The city did use Neighborhood Stabilization Funds for some demolitions, however.

"It was unbelievable and great timing for us," Hall said. "Now, private investors are thinking of buying multiple homes on a street, rehabbing them, so really (the effort) goes on even without the (grant) dollars.

"I think it showed what can happen in neighborhoods. People are starting to get interested in some neighborhoods. The whole revitalization effort takes some time."

The Hudson Avenue property could not be demolished earlier, Hall said, because grant funds were used years ago to purchase the house.

"There's a lot of hoops you have to jump through," Hall said. "We think we're about there. When grant money is used to buy a property, you have to go through a lot of historical reviews and buy it back out of the grant."

Newark received $320,00 in the first phase of demolitions, $44,032 in the second phase and $16,174 in the third phase. The county received $844,259, then $50,913 and $39,274. Each of Ohio's 88 counties received a proportional allocation of the funds based upon the number of foreclosures in each county between 2008 and 2011.

Licking County's foreclosures declined from 1,180 in 2009 to 518 in 2014.

DeWine, who came to Newark for a 2012 demolition, said: "I attended demolitions in many communities. Talked to the neighbors. In every case, they were happy about it."

The attorney general reported Friday that the program helped remove more than 14,600 abandoned and blighted housing units across Ohio, at an average cost of $8,149 per demolition.

"While the number of blighted structures we have removed is an impressive figure, the true success of this program is measured by its visible impact in the towns, on the streets, and through the lives it has touched," DeWine said.

DeWine announced the program in February 2012 shortly after the National Mortgage Settlement was finalized with 49 states and the nation's five largest mortgage servicers. The settlement addressed robosigning abuses, which worsened foreclosure issues during the recession.

Brancatelli, also chairman of the Cuyahoga Land Bank, discussed the effect of the demolitions in Cleveland.

kmallett@newarkadvocate.com

740-328-8545

Twitter: @kmallett1958