Antonini proposes forming land bank

By Peter H. Milliken

milliken@vindy.com

YOUNGSTOWN

Mahoning County Treasurer Lisa A. Antonini is proposing that the county commissioners authorize establishment of a county land reutilization corporation, known as a land bank.

The proposed countywide land bank would be housed at Lien Forward Ohio, a partnership between Youngstown and Mahoning County that was created in 2005 to return vacant, tax-delinquent land to productive use.

The land bank, to be known as the Mahoning County Land Reutilization Corp., would be established under state legislation authorizing county land banks, which was signed into law last April by then-Gov. Ted Strickland.

“The CLRC will succeed in acquiring properties in far less time than previous tax foreclosures,” several months instead of a year or longer, Antonini wrote in a letter to the commissioners.

On Thursday, Antonini and Debora Flora, Lien Forward executive director, proposed in a commissioners’ staff meeting that commissioners pass a resolution authorizing creation of the land bank.

“Youngstown and Mahoning County have one of the highest per capita inventories of vacant property in the United States,” Antonini wrote.

Although blight and abandonment have spread in the county’s urban areas for the past four decades, “the problem is becoming more prevalent in our suburbs in correlation with increases in mortgage foreclosures and the unemployment rate,” she added.

The growing inventory of vacant properties is further weakening Mahoning County’s already weak housing market, she observed.

A county land-bank effort “is the right solution” because cash-strapped municipalities here lack the money, personnel and expertise to run effective land-bank programs, Antonini added.

“When it is a case where the lot is empty or demolition has occurred or the owner has walked away from the home for any number of reasons, it is in the community’s best interest that that property gets under control,” Flora told the commissioners in their meeting.

“The land bank that we’re proposing would provide that level of control within the community,” Flora said, adding that she’d like to have the land bank operating by July 1.

The land bank would have a board of directors whose members would include two county commissioners, the county treasurer, a representative of Youngstown, a representative of a township with 10,000 or more residents and someone with experience in the real-estate business, Flora said.

“Not only in the city, but in the county, you have vacant properties. If you can put a vacant property back on the tax rolls, you create revenue for the county again,” said Commissioner Carol Rimedio-Righetti, the former 4th Ward Youngstown councilwoman.

“If the land bank sees commercial properties that are vacant, and could use them as a tool for economic development, that is also a plus for the county,” Righetti added.

“It’s a public service. It deals with blight. It deals with neighborhood stabilization,” Commissioner Anthony T. Traficanti said of land-banking.

The draft resolution Antonini presented to the commissioners directs that 5 percent of the county’s delinquent real and personal property and manufactured-home tax collections be made available for appropriation by the commissioners to fund the CLRC’s efforts.

The CLRC won’t dictate which properties the program will focus on, Antonini said. Rather, the land-bank board will follow the wishes of participating local communities, Antonini told the commissioners.

The land bank would be audited annually by the state auditor’s office, Flora said.