March In Honor Of Mr. Repchic - Saturday, October 2

[kenneyjoe330]

I believe most of the money comes from the Federal Government and is funneled through the State.   The City keeps emphasising cost yet I have not hear anything from them about recouping this cost.  Has "the City" done any brainstorming concerning getting money back from property owners.  Have they come up with some plan of action or just say "we have X amount of money and we can tear down X amount of houses"  - is that there plan?

It was pointed out to me yesterday by some one who knows - and I had forgoten this fact - the monies received are indeed from the Federal Government and the money has many stipulations attached to it.  One of the many stipulations attached to the monies concerned NEW housing - a portion of the money was to be spent on brand spanking new houses.  If I recall some of this money also could have been spent on rehabilitation of old housing - I don't hear much about that - I wonder how many of the beautiful well built houses in Youngstown were rehabbed?  If there were any articles in the Vindicator about rehab house I must have missed them.  I was a little surprised to find out how well liked Mayor Williams is in Washington.  I think we all know how politics work.  I would like to go back to the NEW house stipulation and ask if the plan of downsizing didn't allow much room for new housing - if A PLAN was presented and a request made to have less NEW houses and more rehab and demolition and the NEED for the demolition and the NEW houses were on double lots and the dilapidated house next to the NEW house be torn down for a better neighborhood.
YADA YADA YADA - and the influence of some of the elected officials in Youngstown and Ohio where brought to bear on this PLAN then perhaps there would be less NEW houses and less bad houses.  Is it too simple of a concept to understand that if you have a declining population and housing stock increases and neighborhoods become blighted that you would put in more houses   Isn't this were planning comes in and exceptions requested for specific fund allocations be altered for good reason ? Is this where government goes amok and reason just doesn't have a chance   Is this just me that sees the situation like this ? 

[Youngstownshrimp]

Kenneyjoe,  Does most of the funding for demolition come from the State or the City?  I believe it substantially comes from the State, if this is so, does the City return the demolition it collects from property owners to the State?  In Struthers, I was advised by the their City that the recent allocation from the State is not assessed from the property owners because they leave it to the State to collect.

[kenneyjoe330]

Thank You AllanY2525 for you great reply -

Today 10/10/10 after reading the Sunday Vindicator - I drove around the St. Dominic Church area.  The More I drove around the angrier I got.  I got out of the area when I came to a stop sign at an intersection and two young men with clubs almost walked across the hood of my van and I had to yield to them.  It was a scary second for me and I realized it was time to leave the area - this was about 4:30 PM.
   Yesterday looking at an entirely different topic I stumbled onto a 30 minute film about a town near Uniontown Pennsylvania - I think it was Brownsville - it was on the Monongahela River.  It told the story of how their very decapitated downtown (a few blocks of dilapidated two to three story buildings) with the help of the state of Pennsylvania was revitalized.  I have heard over and over about the amount ($2,000 to $7,000 per house) it takes to demolish a house.  In Brownsville - after city legislation - the owners of the buildings were given time to either fix the building up or bear the burden of demolition.   Who ever owns the house is responsible for the house - what gets me the most is that all these banks are probably getting tax cuts for these open wounds to leprous blight and the Citizens of the City of Youngstown pay for removal of these sores.  The City of Youngstown pays to have these houses torn down and seeks not one cent from banks who are probably ahead because of tax deductions because of condition of the houses.  Where's the plan to recoup the cost of demolition from those property owners ?   Where's the plan?
   I remember quite a few years back I contacted someone about 2010 and crime in the neighborhood.  I was "told" that actually 2010 had nothing to do with crime but was really an agency who's main concern was land use and acquisition.   After some thought I could see that 2010 was indeed about land management and usage.  Some management and use - where's the plan?
   As I traveled through the St. Dom's area I also thought of how much money was spent on NEW houses?  Was part of the 2010 plan to build one new house for every twenty or so old dilapidated houses ?   Was part of the plan as the population diminished and housing stock grew to get more and newer houses to add to the already over stocked houses ?   I have seen a few new houses on the East Side boarded up - I have also passed a new house for almost a year before someone moved in.  I have also seen new houses built with in a few feet of dilapidated houses.  I strongly believe that all of the new houses built should have been on double lots vs. small single lots - where's the plan? 
    After probably 10 years of so - at the end of his second term Mayor Williams let the "Landlord" Registration legislation begin.  That should help to hold some responsible and those who a landlords - both large and small - should be glad that there MAY be some accountability in housing.

[Youngstownshrimp]

I love it!  We are finally getting it!  Obviously the Mayor and D'Avignon have no clue and had no clue for a long time.  Their answer for our demise is blame the abandoned houses, blame the landlords, "no it was mistaken identity"  as if "they really didn't mean the old people (God bless them), the punks were after other punks so everything is okay."

The Mayor's track record was small banking and the CDA, he never managed any stand alone enterprise, D'Avignon was a housing inspector and learned the art of blame the landlord.

In our JudeoChristian teachings, God mandated that "from the sweat of thou brow thou shall eat" SO, if we do not sweat, it is a direct disregard of our religion and the opposite is EVIL.  This is the root of the evil in Youngstown, IDLENESS.  The entitled here are the majority and when their basic needs are GIVEN to them in return for no sweat, they are idle to do nothing but evil.  This is Youngstown and the more the country becomes idle and entitled, the more Evil sets in.  Yes people, the answer to our woes is very simple, "make all the entitled WORK!

Sadly, our leaders and our community activist will never recognize this even when they really know, the entitled are their voting block and keeps them also entitled.  There is a glimmer of hope, our country's creditors will very soon stop lending us money and demand that we make our own clothes, food,TV's,computers,  furniture,and everything else.  Yes,  Asia is not going to to keep growing shrimp for us at $2 an hour, they have all the dollars they need. We are now a Third World Nation.

[AllanY2525]

Mr. K never left the area.
I saw him in downtown Youngstown a few weeks ago.

Wow... didn't know that.  I was at a neighborhood association meeting the year he
announce that he would be leaving his position as city planner... did not know he
would still be in the area, as he stated at the time that he was relocating for a
new job opportunity.

Maybe it didn't pan out.  To my knowledge, the city has not yet filled the vacant
position - and a city without a city planner is in a real difficult situation, indeed.

[jay]

Mr. K never left the area.
I saw him in downtown Youngstown a few weeks ago.

[AllanY2525]

KennyJoe,

I could not agree with you MORE.

The Youngstown 2010 plan was moving forward, day by day, until Anthony Kobak left city government
employment for better opportunities elsewhere.  With Mr. Kobak long gone, there is no longer anyone
at the helm to push the plan forward - hasn't been for a long time now.  The 2010 plan is stalled, but maybe
not completely dead just yet...

With regard to the vacant houses - yes, they absolutely need to come down.  The built infrastructure
of Youngstown is designed to accomodate a population of about 150,000 people - problem is there
are now about 72,000 ( +/- ) people living in the city.

The city simply cannot sustain this much infrastructure using a population that is less than half of
what it was when all of these structures were occupied.  Although "houses do not cause crime",
they are major enablers to those who wish to hide in the shadows, and do violence unto
innocent, law-abiding human beings.

Think of the criminal element like they are vermin or cockroaches, an infestation of the City of
Youngstown if you will.  When you walk into a kitchen infested with roaches or rats or mice
and turn on the light, what happens?  They run away - looking for another place to hide out.
The same principle applies to all of the vacant, delapidated, and downright unsafe structures
within the city - they are a breeding place for vermin - in this case HUMAN vermin.

Although I do not defend Jay Williams in any regard whatsoever, I do understand the
magnitude of the problem, and the fact that the city has but so much capital with
which to do the demolition work.  I think his administration has put what funding it
has been able to obtain to good use by thinning out the un-needed housing stock
as much as possible, given the resources available.

Youngstown still has several THOUSAND un-used housing units left - multiply that
by about $2,000 (conservative estimates) and $6,000 (liberal estimates) PER unit
to demolish, folks.  If you do the math, thousands times thousands equals what?

That's the kind of dollar amounts we're talking about when we say the city
should have demolished all these houses.  The few remaining tax payers that
are left in the city simply cannot provide the amount of revenues necessary
to do aggresive demolition on a scale with the first few years of the 2010
plan, and yet the dead infrastructure in the city needs to be removed if
the city is ever going to reach a state of "equilibrium", ie: shrink the built
infrastructure down to a size that the current tax base can afford to
properly and adequately maintain.  In other words, make Youngstown
viable and sustainable once again.

Just my $0.02, for what it's worth.....

[Rushblvd]

I agree with kennyjoe regarding the demolition. If there is no plan what good does it do...Yes the houses have to come down, they are a breeding ground for NO GOOD......But why is it always something tragic has to happen to make these politicians get off there butts and do something. Why are not the residents SCREAMING about what is happening in there neighborhoods?---They should be shouting from the highest spot DEMANDING that the Mayor-Police chief and their councilwoman do something---enough with the prayer vigils "Folks they are not getting the noise or attention you want". DEMAND DEMAND DEMAND...Every person in that neighborhood should have been screaming for more to be done..If people do not start to care what is going on in there on neighborhood, the people on the outside are going to stop caring too...These neighborhoods have to wake -up --It is not normal in anyway to give such little regard to human life----

[jay]

I heard this on a local radio talk show this morning.

Knocking down blighted houses is attacking the fruit of the problem but not the root of the problem.

[kenneyjoe330]

The mayor spoke during the vigil.  He promised to remove about 25 blighted homes in and near the St. Dominic Church area as a way to reduce crime. 

Blighted homes do not cause crime.  Bad people cause crime.

It is quite true blighted homes do not cause crime and to stretch the thought you could also say guns do not cause crime either - just bad people using them.  Blighted houses are used for not only drug use but for other crimes as well.  A blighted house in a neighborhood is an obvious sigh that "NO ONE CARES" .  A blighted house in a neighborhood is an infected open sore on the body of the neighborhood and the entire City of Youngstown - the longer these signs of decay and disease exist with in a neighborhood the more evident the hood's worthlessness becomes - beer bottles, cans, paper wrappers and tires show up along with other trash as less and less concern is shown about the hood and the effort for those that do care becomes impossible to sustain a decent neighborhood with out considerable effort.

It is EXTREEMLY INTERESTING that the word HOMES is used as opposed to houses.   This word HOMES is a much more serious word than house.  I am not going to get the dictionary out because we all know the difference between the two.  Now if you put that quote "Blighted homes do not cause crime.  Bad people cause crime." you could say "blighted homes cause bad people who cause crimes.".   My definition of a house is a place where people could live - my definition of a home IS where people live.
These blighted houses are a visible sign of the blighted homes within our society.  These houses ONCE held families, extended families and friends bound together with love and respect for each other.  Each blighted house was once a home where people like you and me had Sunday dinner together, celebrated mildstones like birthdays, anniversaries, graduations and the like - where joy and sorrow where shared with each other.  I hope you can understand that I could not agree with you more, however, the HOUSES much come down.  My concern is that there IS NO PLANNING ! ! !    Taking down the houses willy nilly AFTER KILLINGS PROVES there is NO COMPREHENSIVE PLAN OR PLANNING FOR THE FORWARD MOVEMENT OF THE CITY OF YOUNGSTOWN. 

[Rick Rowlands]

Jay, according to at least one council member, blighted houses DO cause crime! 

[jay]

The mayor spoke during the vigil.  He promised to remove about 25 blighted homes in and near the St. Dominic Church area as a way to reduce crime. 

Blighted homes do not cause crime.  Bad people cause crime.

[jay]

Many candles were lit at the vigil.

[jay]

I'm sure the event organizers will be pleased with your attendance.  I hope the weather cooperates.

[iwasthere]

i was invited by rushgal commie nieghbor to attend which i did accept. i told this frd i will not put up with the GRANDSTANDING POLITICIANS/RELIGIOUS LEADERS WHO WILL  SHOW UP FOR PHOTO OPS THAT DO NOTHING AFTER THE CAMERAS AND OTHER MEDIUMS GO AWAY FROM THIS SITUATION.