Housing agency wants to take rehab funds away from Westport, again
Community not informed of request to transfer $250,000 earmarked to Westport for a citywide demolition program
Above: Mickey Rice stands beside one of dozens of vacant houses lining Annapolis Road in Westport. The “x” signifies that firefighters should not enter the house because of life-threatening conditions.
The housing department, which tried to steer $250,000 earmarked for an impoverished South Baltimore community to a well-heeled foundation last year, is at it again.
The agency is asking the Board of Estimates tomorrow to transfer funds set aside for Westport to a citywide demolition program – a top priority of Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, who recently allocated $895,000 to hire 14 full-time staff to help run the program.
On Wednesday’s agenda is the request to transfer $250,000 from account 9910-901969-9587 (“Westport Reserve”) to account 9910-912135-9588 (“Planned Demo Special Projects”).
The item, a five-line-item tucked away on page 71 of the agenda, is set for the panel’s voice-vote approval as a “routine” spending item.
The president of the community group said she had no knowledge of the proposed transfer of funds.
“What? We know nothing about this,” Ruth Sherrill, head of the Westport Improvement Association, told The Brew today. She said her organization has repeatedly tried to get city funds allocated to Westport, which lacks both a community and recreation center and is pockmarked by scores of vacant houses.
“It makes me just sick,” Sherrill said. “The city has made promises to us over and over, but it does nothing for Westport except collect taxes on our homes,” she said, noting that she and many of her neighbors own their modest rowhouses in the neighborhood south of the Horseshoe Casino under construction on Russell Street.
In March 2012, The Brew reported how the housing department tried to transfer the pot of money – set aside when developer Pat Turner was planning a waterfront development at Westport – to the Living Classrooms Foundation. The transfer was halted when Westport activist Linda Towe objected to City Council President Bernard C. “Jack” Young, who is president of the Board of Estimates.
A Community Center for Westport?
Living Classrooms (whose powerhouse board of trustees includes Young and Mayor Rawlings-Blake) was allocated the money from another housing department reserve to pay for costs associated with rehabbing a former fire station near Perkins public homes in East Baltimore.
Linda Towe, center, meets with Peter Engel, deputy housing commissioner, and aide Stacy Freed in Westport last year. (Photo by Mark Reutter)
“That’s exactly what we need in Westport, a community center,” Towe argued at the time.
Peter F. Engel, deputy housing commissioner, tentatively committed some funds to refurbish a building used by Towe’s group, Teaching Our Own Understanding and Responsibility (TOOUR), for such a center.
But the project never made any headway with the city, Towe said today, and her group eventually had to surrender their building to the city due to a tax lien.
In recent months, other members of Westport have been attempting to establish an economic development corporation to try to tap into the $250,000 reserve funds.
Set Aside for Affordable Housing
The $250,000 reserve was established in 2009 to help pave the way for Turner to develop the Westport waterfront for luxury apartments, office buildings and upscale retail. Advocates pushed the city to require Turner to provide “affordable” as well as high-end housing.
The $250,000 was to be leveraged with TIF public bonds to be issued for Turner’s project for the rehabilitation of 70 vacant properties in Westport.
While Turner’s project has since collapsed, the housing department kept the $250,000 in its reserve accounts.
Deputy housing commissioner Engel could not be reached for comment.