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Round 2 of house demos brings applause
By Jeanne Starmack
STRUTHERS
Photo
A blighted house at 497 Sexton St. is demolished, to the delight of the neighbors. Pusateri Excavating of East Liverpool tore down the house Tuesday.
DEMOLITIONS
What’s on list
During the next three weeks, 31 houses will be torn down with Neighborhood Stabilization Funds. Round 1 of the demolitions took down 12 houses in March. Round 2 started Tuesday, and Round 3 begins next week.
Round 2: 643 Geneva Ave.; 497 Sexton St., 357 Sexton St., 551 Fourth St., 272 Elm St., 210 1/2 Elm St., 23 Short St.; 43 Ridge Way; 140 Center St., 27 Wilhelm St., 20 W. Washington St., 58 Snyder Ave., 121 Woodbine Ave., 376 Harvey St. Pusateri Excavating will demolish four other city houses as part of another package that includes addresses in other communities as well. Addresses for those four properties were not provided.
Round 3: 80 Highland St., 15 W. Washington St., 59 Poland Ave., 28 Sexton St., 179 Poland Ave., 124 Argonne Ave., 66 Hawthorne St., 95 Charles St., 134 Elm St., 347 Creed St., 121 Park Way.
Beside Christine and Drew Neider’s house is a musty-smelling pile of rubble and a gaping hole, and the couple couldn’t be happier.
Gone is 497 Sexton St. — the house next to theirs.
No more roof shingles in their swimming pool, said Christine.
No more collapsed porch roof, broken windows, junk from the garage and bee nests, said Drew.
No more worries that the bank-owned, blighted house was going to be the site of an accident involving neighborhood kids, including the couple’s own 8- and 10-year-old sons.
Mike Pusateri Excavating had made the Neiders’ day Tuesday by tearing down the house during the start of Round 2 of Neighborhood Stabilization Funds demolitions.
The funds are federal money managed and distributed by Mahoning County. Struthers’ share was $550,000, including $400,000 for demolition, $100,000 for rehabbing two houses for Habitat for Humanity, and $50,000 for downpayment assistance and remodeling at some properties, said Ed Wildes, city safety director.
The city is demolishing 70 houses under the program, Wildes said.
Twelve of those houses were taken down during Round 1 in March.
During Round 2, 20 will meet the dust. Pusateri Excavating of East Liverpool is doing the work for around $34,000 and started with a bang Tuesday at three houses. The company had demolished a house at 643 Geneva Ave. earlier Tuesday and was moving on to 357 Sexton St. after the basement was filled in and the rubble removed at 497.
It should take about two weeks to finish the work, Wildes said.
Eleven properties will be demolished starting next week, he said. Another contractor will do that work.
Struthers managed to get its 70 properties under contract for demolition before a June 30 deadline, Wildes said. He said the city has its own condemnation process instead of relying on the county board of health’s, and it was able to move faster.
Money that communities had left after June 30 must be returned to HUD, he said.
Struthers Mayor Terry Stocker, who had driven out to see the demolition at 497 Sexton, noted improvements at some houses along that street.
“People are taking more pride,” he said. “Their neighborhoods are looking better.”
Drew Neider agreed.
It was disappointing, he said, to have the blighted house next door, adding that he would wonder if he should put more money into his own house.
“It scares people away when they see [blight],” he said. Young families won’t move in, he added.