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Rubysdad1975 OP t1_ixvdxf9 wrote

Can’t be the only one who thinks this is a supreme waste of perfectly good buildings.

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[deleted] t1_ixvhq0p wrote

You definitely are not.

This is fucking criminal. A Greek Orthodox prayer garden in mt Vernon sounds stupid, and housing is needed. Plus these are beautiful.

Go tear down some delapidated vacants somewhere, not usable building in mt vernon

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Renaiconna t1_ixx12dg wrote

Given the expense of all the work it would take to make the buildings actually livable/leasable, there are no buyers willing to take the properties in the state they are in. Believe me when I say they would prefer to sell - they’ve been trying to repair and maintain for nearly three decades, but they can’t afford it much longer, it’s a literal fire hazard, and nobody is buying. Nobody. You may think 100k isn’t a lot for a church, but they aren’t Catholics - each parish must fund itself and be self-sustaining. Every dollar going into those properties is a dollar less for the homeless shelters, soup kitchens, furniture sales/donations, hosting community programs like AA, etc. that the church would prefer to put back into the community.

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Salty_Sun_6108 t1_ixz5ek3 wrote

If the price is right, there are buyers. But if they don’t even try to sell…

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[deleted] t1_ixz6vvx wrote

[deleted]

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bmore t1_iy1lpk1 wrote

They haven't listed the properties, so it's really impossible to say if there are any buyers.

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[deleted] t1_iy383xq wrote

[deleted]

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bmore t1_iy4h7iq wrote

>big developer, or some luxury apartment builder which we actually don’t want either

Who is we? I 100% would want luxury apartments or a big developer building in Mount Vernon instead of demolition and a prayer garden or surface lot. Are you kidding me with this?

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Salty_Sun_6108 t1_iyas9zb wrote

You are so full of it. I can hook them up with an agent who will sell it very fast. Sounds like the church is greedy AF, but that is what you expect from churches who don't pay taxes.

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Salty_Sun_6108 t1_iyar4dg wrote

Prayer is stupid. It doesn't do a damn thing. Nibbles? Yea, right. They didn't put it for sale. Sell it.

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CaptainObvious110 t1_iy249i1 wrote

Why did they accept those buildings in the first place then?

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Renaiconna t1_iy3797g wrote

It was a donation from a parishioner, along with the second parking lot across from MedChi. There were initially hopes to be able to use the buildings for something, but the money wasn’t there and really hasn’t been there to be able to do anything substantial with them.

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CaptainObvious110 t1_iy5awf4 wrote

The parishioner evidently had deep pockets then. Otherwise how do you explain having five houses? This then raises the question of what condition the houses were when they were acquired by the church?

If they were livable at the time, then why wasn't that pursued at a time when it would have been much easier to keep them afloat rather than they sit for decades and fall apart?

30 years is a really really long time to sit on properties and to be very frank, that shouldn't be allowed in the first place.

I'm assuming that Mt Vernon wasn't a slum 30 years ago so I have a hard time making sense of such valuable real estate just sitting there without any real buyers.

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BeSmarter2022 t1_ixw0wu2 wrote

They are not perfectly good buildings, the article says they are dilapidated and can’t be restored. It says the church was gifted these buildings and has paid a lot of money to try to keep them up, but they are structurally not sound. The other thing to consider is you know what happens when there’s a vacant building in the city. I do think it’s very sad but it is also not right to force the church to keep this up when they are saying it is near impossible.

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okdiluted t1_ixwt6hz wrote

someone broke down the cost, and iirc the church has spent about $1750 per building per year on them, which is really barely anything and hardly enough to cover upkeep. they're allowing them to fall into disrepair via neglect, honestly.

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TheCaptainDamnIt t1_ixwu2vs wrote

> They are not perfectly good buildings, the article says they are dilapidated and can’t be restored.

No, the article says the church claims they are dilapidated and can’t be restored. So let's just say I'm not just gonna take them at their word on this.

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pk10534 t1_ixxmedx wrote

What even is the insinuation here lol? You think the church decided years ago that it wanted a garden so badly it needed to purposely let these buildings rot and cross their fingers the zoning board would approve their changes?

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todareistobmore t1_ixxvkff wrote

You're really on one about this for some reason, but the difference between you and a church or, say, JHU, is that a tax-exempt entity has every incentive to acquire adjacent property without a plan to use it, because there's no cost to carry it until a plan is developed.

And if those properties should fall into disrepair before there's a plan to use them, so much the better--I'm guessing JHU's going to hear a lot less opposition about whatever they decide to build at the corner of 29th & Maryland now that it's just a vacant lot than they would've while the houses were still habitable.

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TheCaptainDamnIt t1_ixz866t wrote

Well the only party here in the article claiming they are 'dilapidated' is the parry that wants to tear them down for redevelopment. If that's all the proof you require to believe it.... wanna buy a bridge, trust me bro?

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pk10534 t1_ixzgd1a wrote

Just to be clear, your theory is that the church actually has been spending money to properly maintain these buildings over the past few decades and that they’re in perfectly adequate condition, but that the church decided it needed a garden so badly that it’s decided to fabricate this whole story of the buildings being dilapidated? Yeah ok.

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fakeguru2000 t1_iy04r4y wrote

I don’t think 91k for 5 four story buildings even qualify that they took diligent care. It probably took that amount to secure the buildings. 91k won’t even rehab a three story row house in the city.

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TheCaptainDamnIt t1_ixzjbss wrote

I don't have any 'theory' other than I require 3rd party confirmation of claims other than from the party most benefiting from the claim. Just like I wouldn't 'trust' a used car dealer about the state of a car until I got another mechanic to look it over.

But hey, you do you. Believe those Amazon reviews, don't get a house you're looking to buy inspected (just trust the seller) and please DM me about some land I have to sell. It never floods.

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pk10534 t1_iy05w0k wrote

You’re being so facetious right now that it’s absurd. Nobody, and I mean nobody, is saying to not verify their claim. But your allegations still seem unlikely at best.

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TheCaptainDamnIt t1_iy0whg2 wrote

I’m not making any allegations, I’m just not believing theirs without further proof. Now would you like to buy a 2003 Honda Accord with only 465,877 miles? Runs perfect, never had a problem. Cash only and you can’t see it first. I mean you wouldn’t ‘make allegations’ against me by not believing me right.

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pk10534 t1_iy0xmhc wrote

Buddy the analogy is not really working since nobody said you can’t check on the status of the buildings. I encourage the city to do that. So you’re just not really making the point you think you are. The fact that a possibility exists this church is lying (which you’ve yet to give a credible reason for) does not mean it’s likely.

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umbligado t1_iy0w7zh wrote

I went ahead and visually inspected the buildings, comments below. In short, these buildings are in a frightful state, and have likely been like that for many many years.

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Electrical_Appeal_21 t1_ixwjhxf wrote

Right. People complain just to complain here. People don’t like the ugly vacants, but when something is done to beautify the city, it’s a problem. I swear, everyone loves to complain about change AND the status quo in this city. Hopeless. Miserable. Oblivious. People here can be so weird.

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todareistobmore t1_ixwmwxu wrote

Midtown-Belvedere doesn't have vacants problem, this is just degrowth.

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YesIDoBlowCops t1_ixwx5uk wrote

Do you have inside knowledge? Have you read the engineers report? Do you have any experience renovating historic buildings and determining which ones can be saved and which can't? If no, why do you have such a strong opinion on the topic?

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Timmah_1984 t1_ixvlr4v wrote

They’re structurally compromised though. It sounds like they can’t be saved and are barely standing. Maybe with enough money and a second opinion they could be but in the mean time they do pose a risk to the neighborhood. Tearing them down might be the best option.

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Typical-Radish4317 t1_ixvvw1h wrote

Another reason why corporations/churches shouldnt be allowed to own property like this. Absurd that you can run historic properties into the ground and then go oops it must be town down for our benefit.

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BeSmarter2022 t1_ixw1144 wrote

The article says they have been trying to keep them up and have put a lot of money into them.

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Typical-Radish4317 t1_ixw1nag wrote

Lol it says 10s of thousands of dollars... For several houses over 3 decades. That's like the cost of a new ac unit per house. Your typical homeowner puts more money into their house than that

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pk10534 t1_ixxmrt8 wrote

It is also entirely possible the church didn’t have a shit ton of money laying around to pump into these buildings. Their revenue is probably some donations and the offering at their services, they’re probably not just sitting on millions of dollars to renovate and refurbish random property. This isn’t like the Catholic Church owns it

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Typical-Radish4317 t1_ixxn54r wrote

Then sell them. They had 3 decades to make that decision. Like what's the argument here? It's crazy to just sit on huge houses like this when there is a shortage of housing in that neighborhood. Some developer I'm sure would have loved to chip the houses up into multi family apartments or homes

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pk10534 t1_ixxnwv4 wrote

Okay, maybe the church is full of evil, conniving people. Or, hear me out:

The church was gifted these buildings and probably had plans or ideas for what they could do with them. Due to limited funds or declining congregation sizes, they probably realized they didn’t have the money to support that. However, it’s still property nearby that they wouldn’t be able to purchase down the road if it was in private hands, so they figured it was probably best to just keep the properties until the church had more resources, because the opportunity wouldn’t present itself again. However, the problems grew bigger and as such, got more expensive. Fast forward to today, and the church realizes it’s fruitless to keep this property but due to the condition of the buildings, it likely wouldn’t be beneficial to keep them either. So they decide they could be torn down and converted into something relatively cheap and easy to maintain, aka an outdoor plaza that requires minimal maintenance compared to aging buildings.

I’m not saying every decision the church made was amazing or that they’re strategized particularly well, but I feel as though people here are being very, very presumptuous and just immediately jumping to accuse the church of nefarious activity when it’s likely that they just made poor, if well-intentioned, choices

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Typical-Radish4317 t1_ixxoify wrote

Bro this isn't some local church strapped for cash. It has 560 parishes and 500k members. Why you defending this so hard?

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pk10534 t1_ixxpffo wrote

Because I’ve yet to hear a compelling argument from the other side. I’m supposed to believe the church wanted a garden so badly that they concocted this decades long scheme to let the buildings deteriorate that completely hinged upon getting approval to tear them down from the preservation/zoning board?

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Typical-Radish4317 t1_ixxqbl4 wrote

You do realize that is exactly what is happening all around the city right? Like this isn't a new thing. Developers have been buying up and leaving thousands of houses across the city. It's not that the church is evil they are just engaging in the same bullshit as every other scummy developer in the city. Except they are doing it in the affluent part of the city.

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pk10534 t1_ixzgfh8 wrote

You’re conflating redeveloping property into a profit-making building versus a garden. Not the same

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Guerrillaz t1_ixxifrs wrote

They put $91,000 into 5 rowhouses in the 3 decades they owned them in a neighborhood where rowhouses that are properly renovated go for $1 million+. 5 rowhouses that they got for a gift they could sell for pennys on the dollar and recoup the money they put in easily.

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kermelie t1_ixvzany wrote

This narrative that building that are standing can’t be savaged is ridiculous. You put braces up and underpin doesn’t take a world renowned developer to oversee a project like this.

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plain-rice t1_ixw3yai wrote

My understanding (an this is only from limited experience with older buildings in the city) but I think that code enforcement requires they maintain their historic features. So while it might not be unreasonable to repair the structure the historical architecture makes the cost prohibitive. There are only so many companies and skilled workers that can do this kind of work. We ran into this problem in cherry hill a few years ago with my great grandmothers house.

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bmore t1_ixwwnjw wrote

Cool, they should sell them to someone. It's a unique, historic, dense block of incredible housing that someone could absolutely profit off of redeveloping even if they have to underpin and brace.

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kermelie t1_ixyd36p wrote

Maintaining or replicating trim or wood windows on front facades have no structural effect. Just maintaining the front facade and underpinning with cinder blocks or wood framing. There’s grants for these type of projects as well.

I think residents are purposely mislead into thinking preservation is more difficult than it is to allow agencies to have discretion for demolition. If non developers knew everything could be preserved and isn’t cost prohibitive the political pressure to keep architecture would be too great to overcome.

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CaptainObvious110 t1_iy26hb8 wrote

That block loses a large chunk of it's irreplaceable historic features if those buildings aren't preserved.

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