The best idea to come out of city hall all year.
That's how we view the proposal local businessman Aaron Bauer made to the Urban Enterprise Association board of directors this week, a plan to reimburse owners up to $5,000 of the expense of making “visible” improvements to their properties.
“Otherwise, we will only lose more homes,” he said.
For years there have been complaints about how rundown certain neighborhoods have become — from homeowners whose own property values have declined because of the lack of attention their neighbors pay to upkeep, from university officials who note how rundown properties near campus decry their efforts at gussying up campus, and from elected officials who bemoan the lack of tax revenues to be collected from such decrepit houses.
The footprint of the UEA encompasses many of what were once considered to be prime residential properties but which have, over the years, as Bauer pointed out, become anything but highly-desirable today.
Providing an incentive for investing in those properties could perhaps trigger a residential renaissance in those neighborhoods, possibly luring young professionals to move downtown.
There was hesitation by Bauer's colleagues to shift UEA money toward such a program, to the effect that any money spent on such properties would be wasted because the owners would only let the houses fall back into disrepair within a short time — that the owners were incapable of caring for their homes, that they weren't able to “take pride in their properties.”
Still, it seems to us that's a risk worth taking, that perhaps all that's really lacking here is some show of support, some act of faith by local officials, that could, indeed, “change people's behavior.”
And besides, there would have to be a willingness by the owner to make the initial investment, to take on the responsibility of spending money on repairs first.
As we understand it, there would be no upfront commitment by the UEA — no promise to reimburse a property owner for the improvements — only the offer to consider reimbursement after the fact, once the work had been completed.
We know the UEA offered something similar to what Bauer proposed a few years ago to property owners on a section of Second Street between downtown and campus: the board would consider paying for the paint if the owner agreed to repaint his house.
Only a couple of owners took the UEA up on its offer.
We always thought the lack of interest shown in that program resulted from those houses needing a lot more structural work done to them first, before their owners would be ready to consider repainting them.
Bauer's proposal looks to address some of those structural issues — at getting houses ready to be repainted.
There's a good chance that nothing will come of Bauer's proposal, that even if the UEA board agreed to it enough restrictions would be placed on the program that few if any property owners could qualify to take part. That happens.
But Bauer deserves credit for at least bringing such a proposal to the table, for seeing a longstanding problem and putting together a substantive solution for it.