Grant enables Warren nonprofit to help homeowners with emergency home repairs

By Ed Runyan | February 19, 2019 at 12:00a.m.

WARREN

Trumbull Neighborhood Partnership, an 8-year-old nonprofit best known for housing demolition, is expanding into emergency home repairs for low-income homeowners as it settles into its own new Mahoning Avenue facilities.

TNP will begin accepting applications at its new offices at 736 Mahoning Ave. immediately for a countywide program of emergency replacement of essential home-related components such as furnaces, roofing and hot-water tanks and to improve accessibility for homeowners with disabilities.

This is the first time TNP will receive the $200,000, two-year grant from the Ohio Development Services Agency. Another agency received the grant in the past but encouraged TNP to apply this year, said Matt Martin, TNP executive director.

Trumbull County commissioners will provide a $50,000 share for 2019, bringing the total funding for this year to $150,000. TNP hopes to be able to do the same in 2020 and help 30 homeowners in all.

Homeowners eligible for assistance must have income at or below 50 percent of the area median income. For example, a family of four can earn $30,700 or less per year and be eligible. A single person can earn $21,700 or less. Up to $7,500 can be provided to each homeowner.

For people with disabilities, funding of up to $7,500 will help with construction of things such as a ramp.

TNP, which will hire companies to carry out the work, has had a few small home-repair grants in the past, but this is the largest such grant it has received, Martin said.

TNP is best known as the organization that runs the Trumbull County Land Bank, which has demolished hundreds of vacant Warren homes in recent years using millions of dollars from federal grant programs.

But TNP also operates several other programs to empower residents, promote sustainable community development and increase the quality of life in Warren’s neighborhoods. TNP continues to receive much of its funding through the Raymond J. Wean Foundation.

TNP operated out of an office on North Park Avenue downtown for most of its eight years but moved into a large home on Mahoning Avenue on Jan. 1.

For more information, visit the new offices or call 330-647-6301.