Neighborhoods

Friday, November 16, 2018

On Friday, November 16, YNDC held an open house for neighbors, city officials, and stakeholders to walk through a newly rehabilitated unit at 650 Clearmont in the Newport Neighborhood.

The historic 4-plex apartment building was built in 1928 and has been fully rehabilitated. Executive Director Ian Beniston and Housing Director Tiffany Sokol spoke briefly to thank everyone involved in the project then led guests on a tour through a unit in the building. The beautiful 2 bedroom, 1 bathroom townhouses feature a spacious living room, formal dining room, and full private basement. Additionally, Unit D includes two bonus rooms. Updates include new roof, insulation, new kitchen cabinets and countertops, refinished hardwood floors throughout, ceramic tile, updated mechanicals including a new high-efficiency furnace and hot water tank, light fixtures, fresh paint throughout, new appliances, and much more! Units A and B are available for rent for $625/month and Unit D is available for rent for $675/month. Call Leah at 330.480.0423 for more information if you are interested in living at 650 Clearmont. 

Wednesday, November 21, 2018

On Monday, November 19, YNDC, 7th Ward Councilwoman Basia Adamczazk, Seventh Ward Citizens Coalition President John R. Swierz, City of Youngstown Park Director Dawn Turnage, and neighborhod residents participated in a ribbon-cutting ceremony, unveiling the newly paved quarter-mile walking trail at Jackson Park.

The walking trail at Jackson Park in the Powerstown neighborhood had deteriorated significantly and was not accessible to residents wishing to use it.  With funding from the Youngstown Foundation Hine Fund, the trail was paved to provide a smooth, accessible surface for walking.  The trail is also fully accessible for individuals with disabilities. Thank you to the Youngstown Foundation Hine Fund and all partners who made this project possible!

An historic, four-unit apartment complex rehabilitated by the Youngstown Neighborhood Development Corp. was on display for the general public on Friday morning.

The 90-year-old apartment building at 650 Glenwood Ave. – which has sat vacant for decades – will now be home to a number of tenants from the YWCA and the Ursuline Center.

The YNDC took possession of the building in 2014, and groundbreaking on the rehabilitation project began in May.

Tiffany Sokol, YNDC’s housing director, said more than $250,000 was spent on the project and worked through the summer and fall to ensure it was ready for the onset of winter.

Home Savings and Loan created a loan to finance the project for the YNDC.

“It was a lot of hard work. I think sometimes we take for granted how much work is done in these rehabs, as people often only see them at the groundbreaking and the unveiling. But the team worked really hard and we’re really happy with the result,” Sokol said. To read the full story from The Vindicator, click here.

The latest Youngstown Neighborhood Development Corporation renovation project has been completed on the south side.

Four townhouses in the 600 block of Clearmont Dr. were completely renovated.

This is the largest residential project the organization has taken on but it's definitely not the last.

"Typically, we are doing single-family homes," Tiffany Sokol said. "It was a little daunting, being such a big project. It is exciting to see our team grow and see the capacity build to take on bigger projects and have a bigger impact on the community." To read the full story from WKBN, click here. 

It was yet another deadly weekend on the streets of Youngstown. A man was shot and killed on the South Side about 10:30 p.m. Sunday.

He died shortly after at St. Elizabeth Youngstown Hospital. City police have no suspects and have made no arrests yet. His death brings the toll of homicides this year in Youngstown to 22. That's the same level as this time last year.

In Girard, nonviolent criminals are getting a productive sentence. In Judge Jeffery Adler's courtroom, some defendants are given a sentence of mandatory service in the city's community garden as an alternative to jail time or fines. By all accounts, the program has been a success. Offenders gain a stronger work ethic and the Mahoning Valley Rescue Mission is reaping the harvest of a bounty of free vegetables. To read the full story from The Vindicator, click here.

A South Side neighborhood will have a new walking trail thanks to the 7th Ward Citizens Coalition, the city of Youngstown and the Youngstown Neighborhood Development Corp.

A quarter-mile walking trail was unveiled Monday in Jackson Park on the South Side during a ribbon-cutting ceremony.

Despite the cold, rainy afternoon, a group of partners and collaborators on the project gathered at the park to see the trail’s official unveiling.

Ian Beniston, executive director of the Youngstown Neighborhood Development Corp., led the event during which he praised the collaboration on the project and discussed upcoming work at the site. To read the full story from The Vindicator, click here.

As American citizens, as residents of the Mahoning Valley and as members of proud families, Thanksgiving Day 2018 affords all an opportune time to reflect on the blessings and bounties bestowed upon us over the past year.

As we gather today around tables to reunite with loved ones and feast upon succulent turkey with all the tasty trimmings, it is instructive to recall the foundation of the tradition 397 years ago. At that first Thanksgiving in Plymouth Colony, Pilgrims and the indigenous Native American Wampanoag tribe sat down together in a spirit of peace and acceptance of diversity to celebrate their collective bountiful harvest and good fortune.

But in 1621, just as in 2018, not all of this nation’s people had a seat at the table of plenty. Then, as now, hardships, poverty, disease and famine ran rampant.

And today, just as in 17th century Plymouth, the duality of this holiday remains stark. While many Americans rejoice with heaping helpings of reasons to give thanks, many others scrimp, scrape and struggle just to survive another day.

To be sure, however, most of us have more than ample reasons to give thanks on this national holiday. To read the full story from The Vindicator, click here. 

Monday, November 26, 2018

On Saturday, November 17, twenty volunteers participated in the Newport Neighborhood Workday and helped clean up vacant properties on Clearmont Drive.

Volunteers from Tabernacle Evangelical Presbyterian Church, Tri-C Church, Valley Christian School, and YSU helped to remove 10 illegally-dumped tires, reclaim 700 linear feet of overgrown sidewalk, clean up 30 cubic yards of brush and debris, and install 11 LED security lights on homes. We’d like to thank all the volunteers for their hard work! 

LaJuanna Williams' little girl, Andrea, loved the house near the corner of Elgin Avenue on Cleveland’s east side.

“The house was gorgeous,” Williams said. “It had a princess palace window.” Parts of the home were painted purple, one of Andrea’s favorite colors. “She said, ‘Mommy, I would love to live in that house,’” Williams said.

After an accidental shooting took Andrea’s life in April of 2008, Williams decided to buy the house her daughter loved so much. “To me, it was kind of like having a piece of her,” she said. Then, she lost the house too. Williams became one of the thousands of people across Ohio still grappling with the aftereffects of the foreclosure crisis when she fell prey to a form of lending that can become predatory. “I felt like I deceived her,” Williams said of her daughter. “I let her down once again. I couldn’t save her life, and now I can’t save the house she wanted.” 

Rent-to-own leases and land contracts, which are similar, are advertised as affordable ways to own homes. However, housing experts said those who sign them often end up worse off. “In some ways, it's the exact opposite of a regular mortgage,” said Ben Faller, a professor at the Case Western Reserve University School of Law and an Ohio housing expert. “You see contracts, in some ways reminiscent of what we saw during the height of the mortgage boom…that are designed to fail.” The deals often come with unmanageable conditions. The buyer secures a low monthly payment that would be put toward the principal, but, like a homeowner, is saddled with the cost of taxes, liens, code violations and repairs. Like a renter, if the buyer misses even single a payment, they can end up in eviction court and lose any money they’ve invested in the home. According to Cuyahoga County data, in the last 10 years, 1,723 land contracts were recorded in the county. To read the full story from ABC News 5 Cleveland, click here. 

Tuesday, November 27, 2018

Tanisha
Wheeler and Stephanie Gilchrist of Inspiring Minds Youngstown sat down with us
to talk about their first month at the Glenwood Business Center.

Tanisha has
been with Inspiring Minds for about two years and Stephanie served on the board
then became Executive Director last year. Inspiring Minds Youngstown is an
after school and summer enrichment program that focuses on professional
development, creative education, and college preparation for at-risk and
underserved youth in the City of Youngstown. Inspiring Minds started in the
Warren area in 2006 and the Youngstown branch was the first to expand about
four years ago. A branch has since been opened in Philadelphia and branches
plan to open in New York and Raleigh, NC in 2019. Stephanie and Tanisha saw
there was a demand for high school programming in the area and decided they
needed their own space after running the programming at area schools. Tanisha
says the Glenwood Business Center has been the perfect space for Inspiring
Minds, allowing students to gather in common areas then break out into separate
spaces to work on creative projects or homework. While we were there, students
were busy recording an Inspiring Minds podcast in the music room. Stephanie says
that the open-ended creative projects are intended to inspire an entrepreneurial
spirit in the students and encourage them to take charge of their own futures. She
says the students really appreciate that a space has been dedicated just for
them. We’d like to thank Tanisha and Stephanie for sitting down with us and
wish them luck as they continue Inspiring Minds Youngstown programming at the
Glenwood Business Center.