Bravo for Mahoning county! Bravo for Youngstown! Yes folks, we are finally exiting the dark years of Youngstown. The Mahoning County Landbank under Debra Flora is shifting gears forward and is entering the phase of vision for cooperation amongst the public and private sector. Debra Flora's vision of a Cemetary Trust for the community is a God send. After years of uncertainty on how to package the return of the historic cemetary to the community, Debra Flora has the answer. And..........this answer is at our fingertips now and can happen.
The physical Mt. Hope Cemetary is now free of all title defects and current in its property taxes. The PRIVATE entity which cleared and enabled this, has always been interested in returning the cemetary to the community. Mt. Hope Cemetary is surrounded by abandoned tax delinquent parcels, that were always a part of the cemetery for expansion. The cemetary can increase its size by 200%.
If a Trust was set up for the Historic cemetery, the physical cemetery can be transefered to this trust. The Trust then can request that the Mahoning County Landbank forfeit the surrounding acreage because of the delinquent taxes. This trust can be managed by community leaders and funeral homes.
And here is the secret wealth of the cemetery....MINERALS! the cemetery sits on top of the most valuable Utica minerals........WET GAS. This cemetery in 36 months will be generating royalties, in the thousands every month, Hilcorp and Chesapeake have already leased acreage surrounding the cemetery. These royalties will stuff the bank accounts of the TRUST with money to improve the cemetery and beautify the grounds. This has been a vision for several years by some of us, but the vision of a TRUST belongs to Debra Flora of the Mahoning County Landbank.
Could this preclude the building of a cell tower in that area?
Concurrent
Concurrent wherein this project has been ongoing for several years now and will continue but may accelerate now that community may coalesce.
Update:
A proposal is now on the table to create a Trust for the cemetery which will take title to acreage with the assistance of the County Landbank assembly of all other dispersed cemetary land.
A local Bishop has agreed to order the creation of the Trust.
This project is evolving rapidly, thank you Atty. Joe Bishara and CharityLandExchange.com
The Trust is now filling up with members.
Fracking is now saving the cemetery! Part of the negotiations with the people of the Eastside is that they reserve minerals for revenue in operating the cemetery.
I thought it interesting that the antifrackers specifically mentioned the "historic Mount Hope Cemetery" in their radio ads. In reality it is something that 90% of the people in the city have no idea even exists, and fewer even care about.
What! are you sure about this Rick. The Anti frackers mentioning the cemetery in a lie? I need to know more about this, so I can reveal this to the Atty.'s.