Combat Blight

By Greg P Harris

There are over 1700 vacant, blighted buildings in Cincinnati. These dilapidated structures hinder public safety, drive down the property values of surrounding home owners, and are magnets for criminal activity.

There are over 1700 vacant, blighted buildings in Cincinnati. These dilapidated structures hinder public safety, drive down the property values of surrounding home owners, and are magnets for criminal activity.

A) New Dollars for Demolition

In one of my first actions on Council, I spearheaded a comprehensive plan to increase funding for the elimination of blighted buildings. Council passed a major component of his plan to allow neighborhood groups to access up to $5 million in federal funds for eradicating blight in their communities. The proposal also includes a Side-Lot Transfer Program allowing responsible homeowners to purchase adjacent lots for $1 and cost-saving measures to fund additional demolition of blighted properties.

B) Prosecuting Negligent Landowners

I support strengthening enforcement of Cincinnati's Chronic Nuisance Ordinance, and is working on employing additional tools to prosecute deadbeat property owners. This includes a pilot project that would assign police district based prosecutors to work with neighborhood residents to use criminal and civil litigation and other new weapons for going after the holders of these vacant, neglected, and/or crime-ridden properties.

I also worked with Councilmember Roxanne Qualls and others to apply property liens to water bills to make it more difficult for negligent property owners to ignore fines

C) Deconstruction and Job Training

I co-sponsored with Councilmember Cecil Thomas to use hazard abatement funds to train low skilled workers to deconstruct blighted properties. econstruction is a more environmentally friendly form of demolition that requires buildings to be carefully dismantled so that the maximum amount of waste materials can be salvaged, recycled, and diverted from landfills.