Recent Comments
Re: “Family occupying vacant home in Pittsburgh told to leave”
Melissa and Chuck: OOHA's actions just encourage people to think they have a sense of entitlement when a property goes empty for more than a day. That happens between renters for rental properties.
As long as people are breaking in and squatting in properties they don't own, Pittsburgh won't get better.
Get people into these homes legally. Become a legitamite management company and work with the banks, sign liability waivers, and move in approved renters.
I agree that the banks need to actually do something with these properties, but trespassing is not the answer. we have enough squatters and vagrants trespassing and stealing to deal with.
I guarantee that if that stuff stopped, there'd be no more vacant homes.
In the meantime, as long as you are breaking people in, I am going to leave my place barracaded with steal. Sorry. You're just making things worse.
Re: “Family occupying vacant home in Pittsburgh told to leave”
As a landlord in the Pittsburgh neighborhood, I'm split on this issue.
I'm very against banks leaving vacant properties around, but I'm also aware there's a bigger issue of people seeming to think they have a right to squat in and steal from vacant properties. I'm between tenants now and have my property secured with steel plates. I may not take them off if you keep this stuff up.
I deal with this bull between tenants of people thinking they have a right to break into it and am tired of people breaking in and stealing things. That kind of things has got to stop. Many of the less desireable people living in Pittsburgh feel they have a sense of entitlement when a place goes vacant, and the actions of OOHA isn't helping things.
OOHA: Work WITH the banks to get things occupied. Manage the properties and put people in there. But don't just break in.
Re: “Beltline, GDOT, Amtrak reach agreement over tracks near Piedmont Park”
How about we focus on getting the trail to the under-invested South side of the beltline to bring some life there before we start talking about expensive rail on the beltline? The trail is a lot cheaper. However, I think people are starting to think of the beltline as a letter H line (west, east, and aburn ave trolley). Good job abandoning half the people along the beltline. How selfish can you be?
Re: “Living Walls splits community”
They definitely do have more pressing things to deal with, such as why so many properties get vandalized continually in the Pittsburgh neighborhood by crackheads.
Don't attack the churches in general. They are one of the few things holding the community together. But this is a waste of time. Demonic? Hah! Demonic is what is going on in general in the neighborhood. Let's be real.
I'm a landlord and own a rental property in the neighborhood. I spend a ton of money undoing all the vandalism that continually befalls it. I'd love to make the rental property look even nicer, but all my money is spent keeping it in its present shape. Heck, if you have 2 days between tenants, your place gets broken into and copper, heating system, A/C stolen.
The Pittsburgh neighborhood needs big-time help, not to have its back turned on.
And it should really be for the residents, because if no one helps the residents, the issue will resolve itself but it will resolve itself in a way the residents don't like - a.k.a. gentrification. We really only want to force out the crackheads and theives but to cover losses, landlords are already raising rent to cover their losses (first step in gentrification) and I'm about to follow suit. Sorry, but it's a business and the neighborhood has been bleeding me dry. I've done the best I can to keep rent down to help people in the community, but I can't do it any longer. Some people are already putting rent in to the $1000+ range. It won't be long before the demograhic of Pittsburgh completely changes.
So gentrification is the future of Pittsburgh, and these community leaders aren't helping the situation by painting over artwork and ignoring the real problems. The way they could help the community is to assist homeowners and landlords by figuring out a solution to all the vandalism and . In fact, the ones that are helping are the Annie E Casey Foundation and land banks but that will only succeed in helping keep a small number of residents in the neighborhood.
Re: “Bad news on the Beltline”
I own a rental property in the Pittsburgh neighborhood, and they rezoned my property from R-5 to R-4b or something (can't remember off the top of my head) as part of the master plan so not sure why they aren't rezoning elsewhere.
Re: “Atlanta to consider spending nearly $2.5 million on bike projects next year”
Mostly North-end projects? What about the South-end? People down there could use it more since some can't even afford cars. Bikes are a great alternative.