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URBAN BLIGHT: Dan Kildee's Brainchild Aims to Transform Land Policy, Cities

December 19, 2013       Leave a Comment
By: Dave Rogers

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U.S. Rep. Dan Kildee describes his vision for urban rebirth for Flint-Expats.com.
 

The year is 2008 and a pregnant question races across the minds of national leaders:

How will American remake its cities that have been devastated by the mortgage failures and the population flight caused by the economic downturn?

Cities turned for leadership to Dan Kildee, now Member of Congress from the 5th District encompassing Bay City, Saginaw and Flint areas.

On January 1, 2010 Kildee resigned as Genesee County Treasurer to head a non-profit effort in Washington D.C. aimed at assisting urban regions across the country to emerge from the wave of financially-driven blight.

The strategy Kildee employed was to recognize that more cities in the developed world shrank than grew in the last three decades and to capitalize on that by restructuring rather than allowing more sprawling blight.

Kildee had fostered state legislation in Michigan in the '90s that enabled public "land banks" to quickly gain control of delinquent property rather than allow more deterioration during the seven-year foreclosure process.

Once a land bank acquires a property, officials can sell it, rent it, or demolish it. It also collects interest penalties and principal from property owners behind on their taxes, rather than selling off the debt at a reduced rate to private investors, as many municipalities do.

The new non-profit national project involved tearing down blighted properties, and turning the areas into viable cityscapes, parking lots, new buildings, even community gardens.

Kildee's Genesee County Land Bank demolished 11,000 abandoned properties in Flint, leading radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh to obliquely applaud the "bulldozing" of a city he frequently targeted with criticism and scorn. "Just bulldoze it," Limbaugh chortled.

Kildee's work even included the aging, troubled Durant Hotel, needing reconstruction after 35 years of abandonment, and the Barriage Hotel in Flint that was turned into a 20 unit apartment complex.

Flint's land bank idea spread to 100 other American cities including Syracuse, New York, Cuyahoga County, Ohio, and Fulton County, Georgia.

As President/CEO for the Center for Community Progress, funded by the C.S. Mott and Ford foundations, Kildee made a positive name for himself nationally, perhaps figuratively thumbing his nose at Limbaugh's mean-spirited jibes.

In July 2010 he sketched a vision of urban rebirth for Gordon Young of slate.com online magazine: "Shrinking cities must accept that they're not going to regain their lost populations anytime soon. Abandoned houses and buildings should be leveled and replaced with parks, urban gardens, and green space."

Eventually, he said, incentives can be used to lure residents into higher density neighborhoods that have been reinvigorated with infill housing and rehab projects. Local governments could save money by reducing infrastructure costs, and the housing market would stabilize, if not improve.

"We have a 35-year history of letting so-called market forces deal with the problem of abandonment in cities, and we all know how well that worked out," Kildee told fellow Flint native Young, now a writer for Slate.com.

Young is a San Francisco-based writer whose book "Teardown: Memoir of a Vanishing City," was published in June 2013 by the University of California Press. Young also blogs at "Flint Expatriates, for long-lost residents of the vehicle city."

After taking a leave from the CCP, Kildee used his name recognition and his success in development to good effect: he was elected to Congress succeeding his uncle, Dale Kildee, who became an iconic figure in the 5th District post for 36 years.

Kildee introduced H.R. 1550, the Revitalize America Act, which provided a legislative solution to reallocating dollars for Michigan and other hardest hit states. His bill sought to free up to 25 percent of the resources under the program to demolish and re-purpose vacant units.

Last month, Congressman Kildee also hosted a meeting at the U.S. Capitol with U.S. Treasury Department officials, including Assistant Secretary Tim Massad, to discuss updates regarding funds for Michigan and other states.

According to 2010 data from the U.S. Census Bureau, it is estimated that there are 5,846 vacant residential units in Flint; 40,597 in Detroit; and 2,748 in Grand Rapids.

Studies show that removing blight and abandonment in cities leads to greater economic opportunity for communities. According to a two-year study by the Land Policy Institute at Michigan State University, $3.5 million of demolition activity in Flint unlocked $112 million in improved property values for surrounding homeowners. Additionally, by removing abandoned properties in the community, crime and arson rates are reduced.

Recently Kildee helped securing $11.2 million in federal TARP funds to demolish 950 blighted homes in Saginaw.

Kildee admitted to a Saginaw News reporter that the blight elimination project, funded through the federal Hardest Hit fund, is only a beginning to efforts to encourage development and redevelopment in Saginaw.

"But with no first step, there can be no second step," he said. "The one thing we know for certain is that if there is opportunity for redevelopment or new development that opportunity will skip Saginaw by if the city is not ready for it. One of the ways to clear the way for redevelopment is by eliminating blight and abandonment."

Reporter Mark Tower noted that $100 million in Hardest Hit Funds allocated to Michigan will pay for the demolition of an estimated 78,000 vacant and abandoned homes in Detroit, Flint, Grand Rapids, Pontiac and Saginaw.

See more at: http://www.communityprogress.net/our-press-releases-pages-31.php#sthash.WtXjYrHK.dpuf

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Dave Rogers

Dave Rogers is a former editorial writer for the Bay City Times and a widely read,
respected journalist/writer in and around Bay City.
(Contact Dave Via Email at carraroe@aol.com)

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