Two Housing Buzzwords Minneapolis Staff Should Stop Using

And one word that should be more than a buzzword.

Does the above photo make your head hurt?  Good, we both feel the same way.  But for me, the words of the day are "functionally obsolete" and "demands of the current housing market."  If you hear the words of the day, scream real loud.

These two phrases are bandied about by Minneapolis city staffers when they erroneously believe that housing in our community needs to be demolished instead of rehabbed.  And they should be stricken from any future use on the grounds that they are employed neither objectively nor by people with professional experience in the sale of real estate.  I'd go so far as to say they are redundant as well.

First, what "functional obsolescence" means...

How I Would Save the DEED House (2019 Aldrich Ave N)

First things first, I wouldn't actually save this house.  Although I certainly would support anyone who might step up, there are other homes in need of my attention and this one doesn't have enough going for it to be worth taking away from other preservation efforts.  What follows is more of an exercise in fleshing out ways that such properties could be saved in the future.

By now it's no seret that the Workforce Center currently on Plymouth Avenue is heading north to be the anchor tenant as 800 West Broadway gets brought back to life.  Part of that development means that this house can't be on the lot anymore.  The space will be needed for parking.  In recent years, major developments like this have had the opportunity to save homes by moving them, and failed to do the right thing.  Most notably, I think of the Davis Center (the new Minneapolis Public Schools headquarters).  There were quite a few very stately homes on the 2100 block of Fremont Avenue North, and I was only a budding preservationist at the time.  Even though I go to church across the street, I didn't realize that the homes would be demolished until it was far too late to muster any effort to save them.  To this day I still chafe over that loss.

I want to create an environment over north that basically states to prospective developers:  If you do any kind of big project in our community and there are historic or salvageable properties that aren't going to be there after you're done, the expectation is that you will move instead of demolish these structures. The hypothetical scenario of how to save 2019 Aldrich can help us get there.

The first thing I would do if I were to save this house is...

Ascension Church Plans for Demolition of 1707 Bryant Ave N

It came to my attention this week through the Old North Minneapolis Facebook page that Ascension church wants to demolish a property they own at 1707 Bryant Avenue North.  As one can see from the photos, this house is in wonderful shape.  Even if some work is needed, I have little doubt that the place could be successfully rehabbed.  So the unanswered question is why this house should be torn down at all?

There does not seem to be any real need for Ascension to expand to that site.  (and even if there is, has anyone explored moving the home to one of our many vacant lots nearby?)  There isn't anything particularly negative associated with the place, other than its pending destruction.  Instead, it would seem from the Old North Minneapolis speculation that Ascension is moving towards demolition simply because they don't want to deal with the property any longer.

Now, in any case where a perfectly viable house could potentially be wasted, I would rise up in anger.  But I am a pastor's kid (technically a son of a bishop by now) and a long-serving council member at my own church.  So when I see another Christian instiution making this mistake, I speak not only as a preservationist but also as one church leader to another.  And I cannot more forecfully admonish Ascension for this decision.

(Warning:  I'm about to preach here.  And I mean PREACH.)

There are any number of Biblical passages that spring to mind for why a Christian institution should not destroy a gem of a home such as this; the responsibility of man having dominion over God's creation in Genesis, or the communal transformation that happened when Nehemiah rebuilt a beseiged Jerusalem spring to mind as especially relevant.  But the passage I keep coming back to is Matthew 25: 14 - 30, Jesus' parable of the talents.

For readers unfamiliar with the story, a talent was a measure of currency.  Jesus tells a tale of a master who is leaving on a journey and entrusts three servants with his money.  The one who received five talents made five more, and likewise the servant who was given two talents doubled what the master had given him.  A servant who was given only one talent buried it in the sand out of fear that the master would punish him if it were lost.  And although he returned what was given him, he was cast out because he did nothing with the gift that the master had entrusted him with.

And so it is with Ascension and 1707 Bryant Avenue North.  God has given this church a gift, in the form of a beautiful, historic home.  What could be done with such a gift?

When I was in college, I was a founding member of a program called "Project Neighborhood," where ten students lived in a home (that was in terrible shape but restored, and was in the most challenging part of my alma mater town of Grand Rapids, Michigan) in Christian community. Our goal was to grow closer to Christ together while reaching out to serve the surrounding neighborhood--not through proselytising, but just to help where we were needed.  Fifteen years later, there are almost  half-dozen such homes throughout that city.  Closer to home in north Minneapolis, Redeemer Lutheran owns a property that they have used for just such a purpose.

Even closer to Ascension, the Old Highland neighborhood has multiple homes for nuns and there is another spiritual resting place known as Alafia.  Ascension need not look far at all to find examples of how to use similar properties to fulfill God's great commandment to "Go forth and make disciples of all nations."

The master in the parable of the talents would even have been satisfied with the meager gains of putting money in the bank and letting it gain interest.  Likewise, Ascension could take the money they would use towards demolition and partially subsidize the moving of the home to another vacant lot.  Or they could just sit on the place until housing values rebound even more and a sale in the future could bring a nice financial windfall.

The parable of the talents has always resonated a clear message to me:  When God gives you a gift, you damn well better try and do something with it.  Even if you fail, that attempt is far, FAR better than taking what God has given you and burying it in the sand.  Now I can completely understand that finding a solution to what to do with this house won't be easy and will carry some risk.  But there is not a single verse in the Bible where God excuses his servants from taking action because they were lazy or afraid.  On the contrary, children of God are specifically called to action in the face of such obstacles with the promise that our God will see us through.

The servant who invites God's displeasure buries his talent in the sand.  And ironically, burying a gift from God in the sand is quite literally what Ascension would do if they demolished this home.  Instead, there are any number of options available for them to pursue that would result in either a way for them to further their ministry, or at a minimum provide a home to a family and make use of the physical resources that an old home contains.  And so as one church leader to another body of fellow Christians, I call on Ascension to set aside plans for the destruction of this gift and to seek out ways to better serve our community and our God.

Why I Can't Get Excited About Minneapolis Banning Styrofoam

I still remove phone books from vacant homes, but that is thankfully needed far less frequently now.

Recently the city of Minneapolis proposed a ban on styrofoam containers.  The logical part of my brain says this is a positive development and our council should be hailed for a move that will be great for the environment and put our city among the leaders in the nation around this issue.  The illogical part of my brain, on the other hand...

Hennepin County vs. The Wirth House

A year later and the house at 3431 Colfax Avenue North still sits in bureaucratic limbo.  I wrote a previous blog post about how the city of Minneapolis was needlessly proceeding with demolition, and to their credit they have both held off on tearing the structure down and worked with partners in an attempt to find a solution.  There are still city staffers just itching to pull the demo trigger on this one, but as a whole the city is really moving in the right direction on issues like this.  But now the holdup is with Hennepin County and it's not clear if a solution for rehab will be available anytime soon.  We certainly do not have anyone at the county willing to go beyond the bureaucratic call of "duty" at this time.

How did we get here?  Well...

Looking a GIFT Cow in the Mouth

Kemps with a GIFT facade improvement

After Kemps removed the GIFT

Post by the Hawthorne Hawkman, photos from the Old North Minneapolis Facebook page.

I can't say I entirely blame Kemps for taking down the GIFT facade improvement.  After all, they want to tear down two buildings on West Broadway and it doesn't help their position if people are actually excited about potential.  Oh no, it's much easier to keep the buildings looking like blight so people are more inclined to favor demolition.  But it does show their true colors, in that they are willing to make a prominent section of West Broadway look worse in order to further their agenda.

To make matters worse, there doesn't seem to be any public knowledge of what that agenda even is--aside from demolition.  Rumors and speculation have ranged from...

Conservation Districts Don't Do Enough for North Minneapolis

The newly-proposed conservation district ordinance should excite me.  Either the preservationist in me should leap for joy that neighbors may have another tool available to preserve the character of their community, or the libertarian in me should bristle at the prospect of fewer property rights.  Instead, I'm left shrugging my shoulders and responding with a resounding "meh."

At the very first meeting when the idea was first rolled out, I had one question that would shape my assessment of this ordinance moving forward:  How would a conservation district help north Minneapolis?  And more to the point, how would it help "level the playing field" between neighborhoods where it's already easy to preserve houses and features vs. neighborhoods where doing so is continuously an uphill battle?  Could a conservation district be used to slow or stop certain demolitions?  And to bring it home to an area in need of preservation a block away from me, could a conservation district help The Endangered Dutch Colonials of Oliver Avenue North?

The answer back then was essentially...

City-Owned Vacant Properties Made Available for Purchase

Several days ago I received notification from the city that they were making available for sale several dozen boarded/vacant structures as well as a far larger number of city-owned vacant lots.  The City Planning and Economic Development arm (CPED) took out an ad in the Star Tribune to notify potentially interested parties of the offer period from February 10th through the 21st.  The act of seeking out and engaging private developers instead of fast-tracking houses for demolition is a huge step in the right direction for our city.  Quite a few staffers and council members put in a lot of work to get us to where we are today, and that deserves recognition.

But there are a few ways this rollout could have been better, and a few questions still unanswered.  Such as...

Fall Round of Hennepin County Tax Forfeitures

It's that time of year again, where seasons may change but the risk of tax-forfeited properties being sold to slumlords does not.  A nineteen-page list of Minneapolis tax forfeitures was recently sent to neighborhood groups from the city of Minneapolis.  Credit where credit is due:  I've been critical of the city's policies surrounding vacant houses, but they've been a good partner on tax forfeitures.  Specifically, we used to get lists with only a few days to respond with neighborhood organizational positions on what to do with these houses and vacant lots.  The city really went to bat for our communities with the argument that this simply wasn't enough turnaround time.  Now we have until November 26th to submit comments.

The Jordan neighborhood has roughly two dozen such tax forfeitures, although for the purpose of this and subsequent blog posts, I will focus only on houses and not vacant land.  As I took a look at each Jordan property, like 2122 Ilion Ave N pictured above, I came to two conclusions.  There wasn't a single one I'd tear down (except the one that was already demolished by the time I got there), and there wasn't a single one I'd consider an acceptable slumlord acquisition.  So it's time to put our city and county government on notice:  We are watching how this process plays out, and it better result in a better north Minneapolis.

Jordan has a baker's dozen tax-forfeited properties with structures on them.  Twelve, technically, but the thirteenth was an arson-damaged home that was torn down after the list was generated.  Aside from the Ilion house, we have...

How the 4th Street House Was Saved

In the summer of 2011, 2914 4th Street North was a boarded, vacant, and condemned house on the verge of demolition.  The summer of 2013 will see its completion by a nationally known developer, and the home will likely be featured on her television series.

Yes, this post speaks of Nicole Curtis, aka "The Rehab Addict," but it is not about Nicole Curtis.  It is about how the values of preservation, when put into action, produce results so positive that no one could have foreseen them.

Going back through old photographs, I can tell this house first came on my radar screen in January of 2011.  Later that year, the Twin Cities Community Land Bank approached the neighborhood with an interesting proposition...

Code Compliance Shortcomings Contribute to Demolitions

Creative stock photo from ebay.

Not too long ago, the city looked into acquisition of a property in the Jordan neighborhood.  The likely intent would be for demolition, so I went over to take a look.  The house was listed for sale on the MLS, so we were able to get inside and look around.  The house had suffered severe water damage throughout, and the smell of mold was overpowering.  Mold, even pervasive mold, is not necessarily grounds for tearing a house down.  But could the water damage be so extensive that it affected the structural integrity of the house?  We couldn't ascertain that in one visit.

The housing committee in Jordan recommended acquisition by the city for demolition, but only if an approved contractor deemed it unsalvageable.  Before we could take that step, the house went into multiple offers, and the city likely lost out on its bid.

The dilemma we faced was a common one for distressed properties that could go either way.  Namely, if it's NOT torn down, then who will wind up buying the house?  Will it be a known slumlord, or the next generation of problematic owners?  Or is there a chance that a good owner might come along?  The property is viewed in the community as beyond repair, not because of structural deficiencies, but because the community sees it as highly unlikely that a good owner will come along.

In this case, as well as many others, that dichotomy should not even rear its ugly head.  This house was condemned, and therefore before it is occupied--even by an owner-occupant--it has to go through...

Who Authorized the Fire Department's Destruction of 3738 Dupont Ave N?

Post by the Hawthorne Hawkman, video from Nicole Curtis Design on Youtube.

When the city of Minneapolis does really stupid things, like tear down 3738 Dupont Avenue North, they open themselves up to even more foolish allegations.  After the demolition of yet another property over north that a) didn't need to come down, and b) had a willing seller and buyer, North Talk and the Minneapolis Issues Forum are full of allegations of plans to displace, or that there is some "big demo" group behind house destruction and if we only follow the money we'll find the real culprit.  So in the same spirit, I will make my own assumption that may turn out to be foolish:

The owner of 3738 Dupont Ave N did not give permission for the Minneapolis Fire Department to conduct training at his property.

That prospect is one of the many things that bothers me about this house going down, but other preservation angles are already articulated elsewhere.  If I am incorrect in my assertion, the rest of this post can be dismissed.  If I'm not, then either the city has statutory authority to conduct non-emergency and non-administrative entry to vacant properties, or someone downtown authorized and coordinated the MFD training with zero respect for private property.

Why is this a problem?

What is "Habitable"?

The City of Minneapolis has recently examined the prospect of purchasing 3019 Logan Avenue North, likely for the purpose of demolition and banking the land for future development.  I had argued that, based on the city's own report of a $15,000 - $50,000 price tag for bringing the house back up to code, rehab was an option worth exploring.  The Jordan Area Community Council supported the city's acquisition, but asked that approved development partners be given a chance to rehab this house if they wanted.  That was a fair compromise for this preservationist.

During the dialogue between the city and the community, an interesting new word came up:  "Habitability."  In my six years of working on Minneapolis housing issues, this was the first time I had seen this word used by city staff people in the context of demolition vs. rehab.  In this case, the $15 - 50,000 price tag would bring this house up to code, but according to city staff, would not make it "habitable."

"What is habitable?" I asked, almost a month ago.  And the city's response was...

The City of Minneapolis vs. The Wirth House

Contributed photo.

3431 Colfax Avenue North, or "The Wirth House" is yet another property that Minneapolis is needlessly moving forward with plans to demolish.  This cute little spot almost looks like a north woods cabin that's been plopped down into a residential neighborhood.  The garage bears metal lettering of "R. Wirth," although the previous family ownership is not related to the locally famous Theo Wirth.  There are times when I almost--not quite, but almost--feel guilty for jumping in at the last moment to keep a home from a date with the landfill.  If the city goes through due diligence in public notifications, only to have neighborhood activists swoop in at the last moment, I can see how that would be frustrating for those tasked with implementing a process.

Thankfully for my conscience, this is not one of those times.  The McKinley neighborhood gave the city of Minneapolis a list of properties that the organization wanted to see some kind of action or development on.  The list was decidedly NOT a list of proposed demolitions, but that is apparently how our local government decided to interpret it.  Because back in February...

Preservation is Affordable Housing

There are times when I'm asked how it is that I seem to have a different reason for keeping a house from demolition each time the prospect comes up.  Well, it's because there are so many more reasons to save a house than there are reasons to tear it down.  A case in point is 3019 Knox Avenue North, pictured above.

The city is considering acquisition for the purpose of demolition and holding the land.  Because how can there be a housing crisis if there aren't any houses?  I don't know, maybe that's their logic.  In any case, this house clearly is in need of repair.  But doing so, even using the city's own numbers, creates housing that's far more affordable than new construction--although building new isn't even on the horizon at this point.

Let's do some math.  It'll be fun, I promise.

We Can Do Better Than 100 New Rental Properties

Post by the Hawthorne Hawkman, stock photo originally from the Irving Inquisition blog.

Before delving into why that is, I should first disclose that today is my last day as Housing Director of the Hawthorne Neighborhood Council.  And I believe the private market, not non-profits, is poised to take the lead on revitalizing our community--if we let it.

While private rehabbers and new owners are chipping away at the shell they've been in, here comes a new program that could keep that from happening.  Urban Homeworks and PPL are working to buy up 100 north Minneapolis houses and convert them to rentals, albeit temporarily.  The plan after two years will be to sell them back to owner-occupants, and use the interim period to do credit repair and other work with their clients.  This is an initiative I fully and wholeheartedly support.  Except for the part about rental properties.  And there being 100 of them.  And the involvement of Urban Homeworks and PPL.  Other than that, it's great.

Now if this seems like I oppose the project in its entirety, I assure you that's not the case.  Allow me to explain...

This Rant Brought to You by the Green Demolitions North Program

Post and photos by the Hawthorne Hawkman.

There's a technical mortgage term that's been deservedly getting bad press, called "dual tracking."  That's where a person with a delinquent loan tries to work out an arrangement with the lender, and while a loan is in review for some form of modification the lender continues to move ahead with the foreclosure process.  Often this is done without the borrower's knowledge, with the end result being that the borrower loses his or her home without fully comprehending that they were even in such danger in the first place.  Dual tracking is being regulated out of practice by the federal government, and Minnesota has been considering its own legislation to curtail the process.

Apparently though, when a house in Minneapolis is at risk of demolition, the city employs its own version of dual tracking.  Not too long ago, I pointed out that there were viable structures on many Green Homes North parcels.  KSTP did a nice follow-up piece, and the city even opened up some of these houses to inquiries by private parties who could do rehab work.  Unbeknownst to those parties--who, by the way, are willing and able to put forward viable offers for rehab--Minneapolis has not slowed down their demolition processes in the least.

One house in the Willard-Hay neighborhood, pictured above, is another example of...

The Demolition Problem

Post and stock photo by the Hawthorne Hawkman.

Last summer I was asked, as a Jordan resident, what I thought about a house at 2637 Emerson Avenue North.  It was a vacant property on the MLS for a song, and the City of Minneapolis was contemplating acquisition for demolition.  I maintained that the built form of the house was intact, that the interior wasn't beyond repair, and that the block already had four vacant lots and would not be improved with a fifth.  My position as a resident was that this house should be purchased to keep it out of the hands of a slumlord, but that it should not be demolished.

I was not entirely surprised to see that CPED moved forward with acquisition and began the demolition process in spite of my recommendations.  It wouldn't be the first time, and nicer houses have been torn down.  I was pleasantly intrigued though, when Nicole Curtis the Rehab Addict, made a public push to make the backhoe go away.  That move has revealed a few problems with the demolition process, not the least of which is the demolitions themselves.

But the process overall is wrought with inconsistencies that don't serve anyone well.  Stopping a demolition at the last possible moment is stressful on any preservationist.  Having to undo the demo contract can't be pleasant for city staffers.  And losing out on a contracted demolition is fundamentally unfair to the crew that just showed up to do a job.  But as more and more good private market developers are coming out of the woodwork in north Minneapolis, they are proving one of my long-held beliefs:  there is a market for these homes, if they are marketed correctly.

The devil, as always, is in the details though...