Partners' pact: Revitalize Newport neighborhoods

NEWPORT – Hamlet Street just outside the East Row Historic District is a charming corridor with new and rehabilitated homes, a couple of empty lots and a house awaiting renovation.

This street and others in the urban core are on their way to becoming thriving neighborhoods.

Three organizations from Kentucky and Cincinnati have decided they're going to rehab neighborhoods, and not just a house here and there.

Neighborhood Foundations, Habitat for Humanity of Greater Cincinnati and Housing Opportunities of Northern Kentucky, or HONK, are working on six houses within a four-block area of the city.

Habitat President and CEO Ed Lee said he views the partnership in Newport as an opportunity to show his organization's commitment to communities.

"In the future, we would like to get away from building single-family homes to do more neighborhood revitalizations," Lee said. "But to make that happen, we need partners like this."

Newport's housing agency Neighborhood Foundations started working on Hamlet Street on its own in 2008.

Josh Grimm, 29, purchased his house there in 2011, at the start of Hamlet Street's rebirth.

"I was the first one. I was a young professional. I didn't make all that much money, but I really wanted a house of my own," said Grimm, now an account manager at Wild Flavors in Erlanger.

"I love what's going on in Newport."

It wasn't long ago when the street was riddled with blight. Houses were falling apart, and the street seemed to attract "wanderers," as Grimm put it – rather than folks who had a stake in making it a neighborhood.

"We're picking and choosing to try to stabilize the neighborhoods," Neighborhood Foundations Executive Director Tom Guidugli said. "A lot of them are in good shape. We're trying to get the worst ones.

"I think we're making headway," Guidugli said. "There were so many foreclosures out there, we really needed funding to stabilize the neighborhoods."

Guidugli had long hoped other organizations would help make a bang in Newport's neighborhoods and welcomes the partnership with Habitat and HONK.

"We always thought, if we can get more partners, we can increase our capacity," he said. "We are providing affordable-housing opportunities while we're revitalizing neighborhoods."

Habitat, HONK partnered for impact before

Habitat and HONK have each partnered with other organizations to help stabilize neighborhoods elsewhere, and leaders of both organizations say it's a great way to make a bigger impact on neighborhoods.

In 2012, Habitat for Humanity of Greater Cincinnati was recognized for its Over-the-Rhine green development efforts on rehabbing two homes on Elm Street. For the project, Habitat collaborated with SOL Developments, Over-the-Rhine Community Housing, Over-the-Rhine Foundation, Gray and Pape Cultural Resources Consultants and GBBN Architects, said Charmaine Kessinger, Habitat's development director.

She said Habitat has increased efforts in recent years in part because of the housing crisis that left a trail of vacant and abandoned properties in communities but also, she said, "from a desire to play a bigger part in neighborhood revitalization partnerships."

HONK's partnerships include work with the Center for Great Neighborhoods in Covington and the city of Covington in 2011 and 2012, when the group stabilized two Covington neighborhoods under the federal Neighborhood Stabilization Program.

"Using a mix of rehab and new construction, collectively we helped turn around 14 foreclosed and abandoned Covington properties," HONK Executive Director David Hastings said. "Because they were done at the same time in a tight geographic area, our impact was much more significant."

Like Habitat, HONK is hopeful that it can continue such partnerships.

"We're trying to do two things at once. That's a little bit of a balancing act," Hastings said. "What attracted us to partnering with Neighborhood Foundations and Habitat is that collectively we have a much larger impact."

Newport project entails restoration, new construction

The venture in Newport has HONK working on two rehabs, one on the already stabilized west side of Hodge Street and the other on Hamlet. Both started as single-story homes and HONK is adding a second floor so they're big enough for a family.

"They're significant rehabs," Hastings said of the houses at 324 Hodge and 934 Hamlet. With the second-story additions, he chuckled, "we're growing them."

Tim Rolf, whose business Rolf Monument is at 530 Hodge, told Guidugli at a Newport Business Association meeting last week that he's been impressed with the work on the street.

Hastings said HONK is excited about helping finish Hamlet Street.

"The house on Hamlet was attractive to us because there's already been some energy there, and we can help expand what's already there," Hastings said. HONK did not have cost estimates for its work.

Neighborhood Foundations also is building its two new houses, at 923 and 931 Hamlet Street on lots where unstable houses have been demolished. Each will cost about $180,000 to build, with federal funding from Community Development Block Grants, Guidugli said. Construction of the houses should be finished by February, he said. The houses built so far have been appraised at and sold for $90,000 each.

All of the homes will be energy-efficient, Guidugli said. It's a hallmark of good construction and renovation these days, and a must, he said.

HONK and Habitat leaders said they expect their work to be finished in June of 2015.

Habitat will restore two houses, at 908 and 1011 Columbia Street, on Newport's west side – where Neighborhood Foundations already has provided a mix of new and renovated homes. Lee did not have immediate cost estimates on the work.

All three of the city streets were among those that suffered from the 2008 housing crisis.

"It's that whole foreclosure thing that hit the urban core more than anybody else," Guidugli said.

Newport Historic Preservation Officer Scott Clark, also a volunteer site leader for Habitat, is eager to see Habitat complete its work on the Columbia Street houses.

"There's so much untapped potential. The work that's being done is going to help revive some of these neighborhoods," said Clark. "That part of the city is the oldest section of Newport. So much history is in it. It'll be exciting to have people move in and make their own history."

The house at 908 Columbia St. is an 1884 Italianate rowhouse, with plenty of character to restore, Clark said.

The oldest house, at 1011 Columbia St., is a one-and-a-half story Italianate cottage built around 1874.

"It's a solid brick house. The woodwork is there," Clark said. The carved stone that adorns the house will be restored.

"It's going to quite a showplace once we're done."

Young professional loves urban lifestyle

Grimm's house was newly built on Hamlet Street when he bought it in January of 2011.

He has watched his street flourish, with neighbors moving in who care for their property and help each other out, getting mail for one another when someone's out of town, checking on each other. A neighbor of his helped him install a wrought-iron fence.

He has no plans to move anytime soon, saying only that if he has a family later on with children, he might want more yard space.

But as a young professional, Grimm is loving the urban lifestyle he's chosen – and the home he could afford as a recent Northern Kentucky University graduate student with a new job in research and development at Wild Flavors.

"I wanted to be able to walk everywhere. As a young professional who made under $40,000, I could afford to live here and be a homeowner," Grimm said.

"The layout of my house is great," Grimm said.

Grimm said his friends and he like to head over the bridge to get Downtown for ballgames or go to Sawyer Point for events. They sometimes stop at his place before a night out.

"Newport used to be a little more traditional or conservative," said Grimm, who grew up in Newport and other Northern Kentucky river cities.

"I think it's starting to trend." ■