Targeting blight citywide

It could be easy to become discouraged about revitalizing New Port Richey considering the stalled or slow-moving developments at Main Street Landing, Orange Lake, the Hacienda Hotel and Railroad Square and the pending relocation to Trinity of the city's largest employer and property taxpayer - HCA Community Hospital.

But away from downtown, homeowners are embracing the opportunities for a residential fix-up. So much so, that this week the City Council, sitting as the Community Redevelopment Agency, had to tweak the program to ensure sufficient dollars are available at a time of state-mandated leaner local governments.

"We're happy we could preserve it," the city's redevelopment officer, Caprena Latimore, told Times staff writer Jodie Tillman.

So are we.

Gutting it would have sent the wrong message about a program that has awarded 837 grants worth approximately $1.2-million since its inception six years ago. The match requirements have brought a private sector investment nearly eight-fold higher. It is an envious return on a modest deposit that has brought new construction, bettered the city's appearance and increased property values.

Just as important, the residential grant program allows homeowners to buy into the long-term redevelopment effort that has gained the most notoriety for its downtown stumbles. The grant money produces an immediate, tangible benefit for residents and is available as a result of a previous council's controversial decision to designate the entire city as blighted. The maneuver allowed all areas of the city to retain higher tax revenues generated from rising property values. Previously, the city's redevelopment district focused on only downtown, an area that turned out to be too small to generate meaningful revenue to reinvest and brought derisive grumbling from some quarters about an exclusive focus on commercial redevelopment.

The two-pronged residential grants disburse up to $1,000 per homesteaded property, regardless of value, for repairs or maintenance to a home's exterior for beautification. The broad definition allowed grants to be spent on landscaping, irrigation systems, driveways, fences, pool decks, screen enclosures and pavers.

New rules say the money must be spent on items "affixed to the main structure of the property for beautification, safety and hurricane preparedness." The approved items include fixing or replacing roofs, windows, exterior doors, fascia, soffits, gutters, hurricane shutters and external painting. The changes are appropriate considering irrigation systems and landscaping might be selling points to prospective buyers, but do not add to the appraised value of a house.

The city also narrowed the focus of program's other component, residential reconstruction grants of up to $5,000 on new homes or existing homes valued at less than $125,000, to eliminate spending on recreational items such as swimming pools, spas and patio additions.

The city says the tighter guidelines will allow the grant program to do a better job of its original intentions - targeting true blight and benefitting families most in need. Who could argue with that?

[Last modified September 13, 2007, 20:30:27]