Eighth and Sycamore Tower [John Senhauser Architects]
Following committee approval yesterday, City Council appears poised to approve a $7.3 million financial package that should bring a 130-unit North American Properties project to reality.
Designed by John Senhauser Architects, the $52 million, 15-story residential tower will accelerate the transformation of the northeastern corner of the central business district, where business leaders have been trying to rebrand it as the Eighth Street Design District for its cluster of design agencies.
As City Hall has done in the past, 3CDC will be used to build and operate a 500-space public parking garage, along with 10,000 square feet of commercial space, which is estimated to account for $16.5 million of the total project cost.
Eighth and Sycamore Tower [John Senhauser Architects]
Eighth and Sycamore Tower [John Senhauser Architects]
The project was first announced two years ago, and will take the place of the former two-story Red Cross building at the southeast corner of Eighth and Sycamore Street.
While the parking garage seems oversized at face value, it is part of a larger development efforts taking place nearby, including a 115-room Holiday Inn that includes no parking at all. As part of that deal, the City of Cincinnati agreed to build a parking garage that would provide 120 spaces. Originally planned to include 610 parking spaces, the new parking garage will support both developments and replaces an aging public garage that once occupied the site.
The relatively quick procession of this project stands in contrast to the 111-unit residential tower North American Properties recently completed called Seven at Broadway. Unlike this yet-to-be-named project, Seven at Broadway took more than a decade to complete, with an above-ground parking garage occupying the site since 2003.
The apartments at Seven at Broadway are some of the priciest in the city, and were pre-leased at a pace that surprised developers and investors. Price points have not yet been identified for this new project.
GE Tower Concept at SW Corner of 8th/Sycamore [WLWT]
The completion of the Holiday Inn and this new residential tower will significantly alter this corner of downtown, but many still view the two large surface lots across Sycamore Street as the final major pieces of the puzzle.
The southern of the two lots is controlled by St. Xavier Church, and the northern lot is owned by Columbia Oldsmobile Company.
When General Electric was searching for a site for their new Global Operations Center, which ultimately located at The Banks, a rendering surfaced that showed an office building for GE on the northern of the two lots. Rumors have once again begun circulating online that the mockups might be or could be related to potential corporate offices for General Electric should they take action on their relocation threats to the State of Connecticut.
The full City Council will vote on this financial package on Wednesday
A newly released report shows that homelessness in Cincinnati and Hamilton County declined in 2014 to levels not seen since 2010.
The report comes from Strategies to End Homelessness, a local leader of 30 homeless service organizations. Using data from the Homeless Management Information System, the non-profit organization said that they saw positive results all around.
The number of people on the streets, which saw a large jump in 2013, returned to 2011 levels. Those staying in emergency shelters also dropped by 7% since 2012, which officials say can be attributed to the increase in people being served by permanent housing programs, which has increased 167% since 2010.
Homelessness in Hamilton County 2014 [Provided]
Local leaders also say that this drop is also partially a result of their member organizations’ homeless prevention efforts, which Kevin Finn, CEO of Strategies to End Homelessness, told UrbanCincy in March is one of the most critical factors in reducing homelessness.
Since 2011, these organizations have seen only 10.2% of the people served by their shelter diversion programs later become homeless. Finn says that preventing people from needing a shelter is not only effective, but it saves money as well.
“Homelessness prevention activities work and at a fraction of the cost of assisting after a person is already homeless,” said Finn. “Stopping people from ever needing to enter a homeless shelter just makes sense.”
The report found that men make up 59% of Cincinnati and Hamilton County’s homeless population, and that some 66% of those that are homeless are black.
One of the national trends is that women and children make up one of the fastest growing segments of the homeless population. In Cincinnati and Hamilton County, the report found that children are 29% of the area’s homeless – 6% of which are children without adult accompaniment. Furthermore, approximately 15% were found to be veterans.
In all, the number of people on the streets, in shelters, or in transitional programs in all of Hamilton County was 7,810 in 2014.
Local leaders also have reason to be optimistic due to the ongoing investment in new facilities, through Cincinnati’s Homeless to Homes program, to care for the area’s homeless population.
“In 2015, three improved shelters are opening, significantly improving the quality of services being offered to the homeless in our community,” Finn said. “We are also hoping to expand prevention efforts, so that fewer people will have to experience the trauma of homelessness.”
Last year over 100 people attended a series of workshops focused on rehabilitating distressed properties in Over-the-Rhine. The 3OTR Owner-Occupied Workshop series was hosted by the Over-the-Rhine Foundation, and each session featured realtors, rehabbers, architects and other experts telling their stories to people who were interested in rehabbing properties of their own.
Organizers say that the series was so impactful that its graduates even earned mention as qualified potential developers by 3CDC for city-owned properties north of Liberty Street.
Prospect Hill in Over-the-Rhine [Travis Estell]
“When we conducted our evaluations of the workshops last spring, participants spoke loudly that they benefited most from hearing from individuals who acquired and rehabbed properties,” said Thomas Hadley, an Over-the-Rhine Foundation board member. “This workshop offers hands-on insights into what it takes to do a project in OTR.”
Now, a year later, some of the graduates are returning to share their stories with a new crowd. The event, this time called Lessons Learned, will focus on four rehab projects that resulted from the last year’s series.
Planned discussion topics, organizers says, will include financing, structural changes, LEED projects and combining a multi-family into a single-family building. One of the sessions will even feature a project that involves rehabilitating a three-unit building with retail.
“Lessons Learned is a unique opportunity to find out how alumni from last year’s workshops used what they learned to acquire and rehab property,” Hadley explained.
The workshop will be held on Saturday, June 6 from 9am to 11am at Venue 222 on Fourteenth Street in Over-the-Rhine. Those interested in participating can register online for $10v.
New ideas can come from anywhere and Cincinnati is no exception. People have taken notice of what is going on in Cincinnati. In the spirit of the latest episode of The UrbanCincy Podcast, I thought it would be nice to highlight some ideas that worked so well in Cincinnati that other cities have adopted them.
However, it is important not to forget that great ideas often come from great turmoil. Innovative ideas often only receive the light of day because the situation they are created in is so dire. Keeping that in mind when reading this story can remind us of how far Cincinnati has come in some areas, and how that journey can inform efforts in other cities.
Here are four key ideas that have come from Cincinnati. This is by no means an exhaustive list, so please let us know in the comment section if you have other additions.
Idea 1 – Collective Impact
The concept of collective impact stems from the idea that numerous individual efforts are being undertaken in places to reach similar social goals. Thus, collective impact’s main role is to take those individual efforts and bring stakeholders together to increase the efficacy of each individual’s work around the organizing principal.
The Strive Partnership in Cincinnati was the first group to take this approach and develop a unique model that is now being applied around the country. With a focus on building what they call “cradle to career partnerships”, which seek to improve agreed upon outcomes for children throughout their growth to adults, collective impact is a truly national phenomenon.
Idea 2 – The Collaborative Agreement
In the wake of the killing of Michael Brown by Ferguson, Missouri police officer Darren Wilson and the resulting protests and social unrest, many Cincinnatians could not help but think of the parallels to the killing of Timothy Thomas by Cincinnati police officer Stephen Roach.
Following the 2001 race riots in Cincinnati, a group of concerned community members and representatives from law enforcement came together around shared principles to improve community policing and engage with the stakeholder more in how they felt the department should function to simultaneously improve outcomes and relations with the communities where they work. This became the document known as the Collaborative Agreement, and is now considered a blueprint for conversations in Ferguson and beyond on how to begin creating a more inclusive environment for local residents regardless of their background.
Idea 3 – Community Learning Centers
The philosophy behind Community Learning Centers is straightforward: schools are neighborhood assets and should be utilized as such. Combine that philosophy with in-school wrap-around services that are funded in part through community relationships and you have a reproducible model for school improvement and neighborhood revitalization.
Community Learning Centers have latched on in New York City, where Mayor Bill de Blasio (D) has approved the creation of new community learning centers as a part of his educational platform, and within the Department of Education where a 21st Century Community Learning Centers program supports the creation of such setups around the country.
Idea 4 – 3CDC
Whether you agree with their tactics or not, it is hard to argue that the Cincinnati Center City Development Corporation is not influential in the ongoing real estate redevelopment bonanza that is going on in and around Cincinnati’s center city. Perhaps not surprisingly, other cities have taken notice.
3CDC’s combination of non-profit status gives it independence, and its relationship with large local companies provides it with formidable financial resources. The potent combination has been labeled as a “model for urban transformation” by the Urban Land Institute, and other cities are considering adopting the 3CDC model that has accomplished a great amount in redeveloping socioeconomically depressed urban areas.
This number can be a bit misleading since it does not include the many more people who have recently lost their home and are now staying with a family member or friend, or are unable to be counted at all.
The way in which local organizations are handling this situation is different today than it was decades ago. In the past the trend was to provide what experts refer to as site-based units. This has changed over the years to a model more akin to Section 8 housing vouchers, where subsidies are provided for people to go find housing out on the open market.
City Gospel Mission [Provided]
Drop Inn Center Women’s Shelter [Provided]
Drop Inn Center Women’s Shelter [Provided]
According to the Strategies to End Homelessness, approximately 97% of the 3,300 people in permanent housing in Cincinnati are in these scattered sites. Part of the reason for the change is due to changing funding priorities, while another large factor is that many people reject the idea of having supportive housing built in their neighborhood.
This has caused problems for local leaders who view the Homeless to Homes plan, which includes the construction of five new shelters, as part of a long-term solution. While the shelters are new and improved, they also typically include an overall reduction in total units provided. So with the total number of units and the number of homeless remaining constant, some are wondering what the ultimate solution is.
Salt Lake City has recently received national praise for their homelessness program where they simply have built and provided housing units for every homeless person in their community. It is a nod to past techniques, but one that appears to be getting results.
While it has received the attention, not everyone is convinced that Salt Lake City’s approach is all that unique, or all that comprehensive.
“It’s about giving people housing,” Kevin Finn, President and CEO of Strategies to End Homelessness, told UrbanCincy. “If homelessness is the problem, then providing housing is the solution.”
The problem, Finn continued, is that the vast majority of the funds that are provided by the Federal government has strings attached and almost never allows for prevention programs. And with homelessness typically being what Finn calls a short-term crisis, a strong investment in prevention might actually be more effective and economically sustainable.
“Somewhere around 80% of people who become homeless end up getting out of homelessness on their own,” noted Finn. “Unfortunately, we seem to be discouraged from even using the money that could be used for prevention on prevention.”
While Finn acknowledges that simply providing housing to those who truly need it is more effective than anything else, he also is quick to note that taking preventative measures can be far more cost-effective.
In Hamilton County, for example, it costs approximately $3,300 per year to provide supportive housing to someone. At the same time, it costs around $1,300 per year to shelter a person on a temporary basis, and just $1,100 annually to prevent someone from becoming homeless.
“I would agree that Salt Lake City has the right model for those that are homeless, but I would say that prevention is even more effective than that,” Finn emphasized. “The real challenge is to figure out what the right solution is for each individual person.”
Further complicating the prevention approach is its inconsistent funding levels from the Federal government. According to Strategies to End Homelessness, virtually no funding was provided for prevention prior to 2009, but then the American Recovery & Reinvestment Act infused local agencies with around $2.2 million annually over the next three years. At its peak in 2011, it resulted in the prevention of 2,800 people from becoming homeless.
When the stimulus program wound down, those funds went away with it; and those numbers have been in rapid decline ever since. Such inconsistencies make developing long-term plans and strategies next to impossible.
“The issue we struggle with is trying to reduce homelessness when the landscape of the resources is constantly changing,” said Finn. “From 2012 to 2013 homelessness increased in Hamilton County; but it was less than 1%, and considering our resources had been decimated it was a bit of a moral victory.”
Beyond just the funding issues, understanding the problem and recognizing the actual need for each person could yield even greater performance and savings.
First and foremost, Finn says the goal should be to determine who is close to homelessness, but can be prevented from reaching it. From there he says that it is important to figure out who has recently become homeless, and what level of assistance they need – short- or long-term. Not doing so could create the risk of providing the funds for someone to have long-term support, even though short-term support is all that is needed.
In order to tackle each case appropriately, local leaders are developing an early stage approach that is in line with nationally recognized assessment process for determining these details that can often be difficult to uncover.
Further assisting those efforts are the already established programs operating county-wide, including the Central Access Point hotline that allows for people to call and give notification that they are at risk.
Even with all of the challenges, Finn remains optimistic about the future. The City of Cincinnati has recently increased its amount of funding for human services, and has designated reducing homelessness as a priority for those funds. In addition to that, the United Way of Greater Cincinnati is now providing $150,000 per year for prevention efforts.
New data is scheduled to be released in the near future with updated figures on the region’s homeless population. While it is not yet public what those numbers are, it is expected that they will be along a similar trajectory as recent years. The hope, however, is that this trajectory starts to change sooner rather than later.
“Ultimately if we can prevent people from ever coming in, then we can save a lot of money and save that household the trauma of becoming homeless,” Finn concluded.
