S6:E7- Vacant Properties in Small Towns with Liz Kozub

You are listening to the Growing Small Towns Show, a podcast dedicated to supporting you, the person who really cares about the future of your small town. We believe when people get better, everything gets better, and our episodes offer the ideas and actions that prioritize people and small communities. Thank you for listening.

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Our guest on today's episode is Liz Kozub. Liz is an Associate Director of Technical Assistance at the Center for Community Progress. Liz is— this, this interview, this guest came to me on an outreach where they reached out to me and said, hey, like, we do this thing, we think it'd be good for your show. Again, let me just reiterate, if you're listening to this and you think I have something that I would like to contribute to the show, please reach out. We always love it when this happens. And this is one of those topics that I think a lot of communities deal deal with and don't always know exactly how to address it. And the smaller the community gets, sometimes the harder to— the harder it can be to address these things. And we're talking about vacancy and, and really not just vacant buildings, whether it's storefronts and commercial buildings or residential, but really the ones that are falling into disrepair. And Liz offers, with all of their experience working with communities all over the country, she offers some strategies, tools that we can look at, whether it's policy, you know, whether it's working on codes, thinking, thinking about codes, what kinds of enforcement can we do? And some of this really just comes down to that challenge sometimes of managing the politics of ownership of these buildings. You know, like, whose responsibility is it to take care of these things? And Liz has a lot of experience in this topic. She shares a lot of good ideas for what any single one of us can do if we're facing these things in our own towns. And, you know, because we're coming live to you every week— well, it's not not live, whatever, it's recording, but our podcast studio sits in a 100-year-old building on a main street in a town just like yours. We really, we deeply care about the preservation, conservation of old buildings, which sometimes end up being the ones that get vacated and then continue to fall into disrepair. We hate to hear of old buildings being torn down. So with that, get out your pens and paper, friends, and enjoy this conversation with our new friend Liz. Hey Liz, welcome to the Growing Small Town Show. So happy to have you here.

Yeah, thanks Rebecca. I appreciate the opportunity to chat.

It's, uh, it's you, you work in something that a lot of, uh, a lot of small communities can relate to. And today we're gonna talk a bit about vacant properties, right? And strategies of what communities can do. Oh, and I'm, I'm guessing we're gonna get into like whether or not you have a person paid to do that, which most of our small towns don't. We're going to dive into some of those strategies, but why don't we start with just a little bit of background? Tell, tell our audience who you are, how you got into this work, and a bit more about the Center for Community Progress.

Yeah, I appreciate the ability to give an introduction. So I, I work in communities that are dealing with vacant property challenges across the country at the Center for Community Progress. But how I got my start in this space is when I was really in grad school, I was looking for an opportunity to work in local government because I understood that that was a pathway I wanted to move into. So I was interviewing for a few positions and had the opportunity to work for a smaller community, the Borough of East McKeesport in Pennsylvania, a town of about 2,000 residents that was really looking at opportunities to address their vacant property challenges across the community. And at the time when I was interviewing places, I also had the opportunity to work for a larger, more resourced community that had kind of similar needs, but I'll shout out the borough manager, Rosenberger, who was like not taking no for an answer. And I think that's so indicative of smaller communities where there might be just one paid staff person that really doesn't have a lot of opportunities to say no. They really want to make sure that they can get a yes from folks to really see their vision for their community come to life. So in that role, I helped essentially inventory the vacant property challenges across the borough. So they knew that especially single-family residential properties were vacant, but they didn't have a sense of how many or kind of the reasons behind the vacancy or who owned them, um, to then start to think through what that strategy could look like to address those properties. So their focus was on single-family residential. They also had kind of a main street that was struggling too with some significant vacancy challenges. So I went property to property in the community to rate them in their condition, and then worked alongside a code enforcement officer who was there part-time to really think through who owned them, were there code issues, were they bank-owned and the bank just wasn't taking care of the property, and like, how can we hold some of those individuals accountable or, or see what their plan was for, for that property so that it could become a new home for somebody else.

Uh, okay, so real quick, a question that immediately came to mind is, was there, was there some major economic factor or situation that created the, this vacancy situation for this particular city? Because I, you know, you're, you're talking about Pennsylvania. A lot of times if a mass, a major employer leaves, um, that's kind of what ends up happening. Was there, was there some sort of a factor like that for this community, or was it just kind of out migration over time?

This community, it was slow out migration over time, but it was situated in a region of Pennsylvania called the Mon Valley, which was the former steel industry of the, you know, country essentially. And so a lot of its neighboring communities were seeing really significant decline because they were the location of where a lot of those factories and mills and kind of industries had closed and left. So it was like a trickle effect into this particular community. Community who didn't necessarily, um, wasn't the home of some of those manufacturers, but it was impacted because of the kind of regional disinvestment and outmigration that was happening.

Okay. Um, when you first— when we were first discussing these as vacant properties, I wasn't thinking about residential, which, I mean, obviously that's a thing, but I didn't realize that that would be something that you would do typically. I mean, it's, it's interesting to me. So What— tell— maybe keep walking us through this. So like, you, you start this process of going door to door, figuring out, was there a large majority of these, uh, properties, whether residential or commercial, that were owned by outside investment or people that— like non-local ownership?

So at the time, most of the properties that were vacant actually were owned by somebody who had passed away and maybe didn't have a, a will set up where there was a natural transition or a legal transition of happens to those properties. And so there are heirs' properties issues. And this was back in kind of 2012. So what we see today now is a huge influx of outside investment that is purchasing up residential properties that is causing significant harm and challenges for communities. So in that role, kind of in the borough of East McKeesport, thinking about like what happens next and who can step in if the market is significantly depreciated and there's repair needs that are required and at the same time, the state of Pennsylvania or the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania was contemplating a new law called land banking, which is essentially a quasi-governmental entity that is solely responsible for addressing vacant properties in a community. There was a large increase of land bank legislation happening around that time to deal with the mortgage foreclosure crisis and the influx of residential vacancies, but land banks have existed since the 1970s or so in a number of communities kind of focused on that widespread vacant property challenges. So while I was in that position, I actually had the opportunity to connect with my now colleagues at Community Progress who were helping a coalition of statewide partners really think through that land banking legislation and how those entities can have, you know, really important and special powers and tools to deal with challenges that municipalities aren't necessarily prepared to deal with, which is ownership and long-term stewardship of vacant property. Properties. And so the vast majority of land banks have been focused on the residential property challenges that exist of that kind of vacancy, single-family, multi-unit properties, etc.

So yeah, go ahead, go ahead. I was going to say, so what were some of the strategies that you ended up deploying with this, with this community?

Yeah, so I mean, the biggest thing was, was looking at ownership of like who are the owners of the properties and then how can the appropriate tools be matched to those owners. And so, you know, going after a family that's kind of holding onto a property and trying to figure out what to do with it, and it's like an enforcement standpoint, probably isn't the most effective or equitable way to deal with that. But if you have, you know, an out-of-state owner that, you know, is holding onto a property that's causing significant harm, right? If there's a vacant property in a residential neighborhood fairly stable, it can, it can have really significant impacts in terms of the value of the other properties on that street. So that really impacts individuals' wealth and ability to pass that wealth on to families. And so thinking about like who owns the properties and what are, what's the most appropriate legal tool to match that, that issue to ultimately bring it into compliance where it's occupied, where, you know, the steps aren't crumbling, where it couldn't be an attractive hideout for kids that, you know, may be up to no good. And there's some issues that come along the road with those, those types of issues.

Okay, so maybe, maybe let's— I'm trying to think of how to separate. If we separated out residential versus commercial, because I think the impacts of those things are— they're obviously, they're felt by a community and the individuals impacted by their existence, right? Because it doesn't feel good to drive by a dilapidated, rundown property, whether it's commercial or residential. But I want to get— I want to really get to like the strategies. What do people do? So I'll maybe let you decide. Do we want to talk through— because are the strategies kind of the same whether it's commercial or residential? And all dependent upon ownership, you know. So do we want to start with like, okay, if it's an out-of-state, non-local owner, what are the strategies? Or I, you know, maybe get us through that. I don't know, I don't know the easiest way to bucket it or categorize them.

So let's start with residential because the strategies are different, and sometimes it's easier to just talk about what we know is really effective in the residential property space, and then like where some of the limitations are for applying those same strategies. Strategies in the commercial property space.

Perfect.

So when we're looking, you know, at Community Progress and the communities that we kind of serve across the country, again, we're, um, we're a national nonprofit focused on helping kind of address vacancy challenges from properties that are vacant for 10 years causing significant harm, and then also preventing vacancy from happening. So recognizing that a lot of older structures may have deferred maintenance, and how can we make sure that, that, you know, doesn't become vacant worse, like doesn't become a demolition candidate in the future.

And so to quick interject and say that, yeah, so many of our main streets, um, and, and small communities are filled with buildings like that, right? Like the building that I'm sitting in was built in, uh, the '20s, the early '20s, um, and the investment of, of just trying to bring it back to life and, and resurrect it from that future of of likely demolition, you know, without all of the infrastructure upgrades and stuff. It's just, it's a massive undertaking.

Yes.

And there's a lot of buildings that have that threat of vacancy, maybe aren't vacant today, but without massive repairs or upgrades will be. So just had to say that that's a really common challenge. And nobody really, I mean, I don't know that anybody really wants to demolish their historic buildings. But a lot of times it just feels like the only answer because of the expense, right, to rehab them. So, yeah.

And a lot of communities, unfortunately, without the resources, are so often reactive to a problem that if there were better times or additional money, could have been addressed 5 years ago. And it's kind of just this constant game of catch-up. How do we address kind of from a reactive standpoint to these properties. And that's often when demolition becomes kind of the only answer because so much has happened over time. And really, time is like the worst enemy of a vacant property. Like, the intervention needs to happen as close to the point of vacancy as possible so that it's stabilized and preserved, um, so that we're not spending time and energy and resources on something that we can never get back once it's gone. It really impacts the fabric of of a community, especially of a main street in that regard. So when we're thinking about just like the kind of cycle of like, how do we prevent vacancy from happening? When it does happen, what are the tools that we can bring to bear to make sure it doesn't cause additional harm on the community? And again, for the ownership is important, but it's really understanding that like data and the scale and scope and what properties are vacant and how can we target our limited resources in a way that's really going to be impactful. So if there's a Main Street, that's kind of a discrete area, but if a community has a couple of Main Streets, kind of where do we focus? If it's residential challenges, what are the opportunities to maybe address tipping point neighborhoods or go into a neighborhood that might see significant vacancy? So kind of understanding the lay of the land is the first step. And then code enforcement is another tool that we often work with communities to, to better kind of understand how it can be applied in a way that can be effective. I know in a lot of communities, code enforcement is often a very part-time position, if there even is one. And so there might be, and there's, you know, there is a lot of kind of feelings of like, folks are allowed to do what they want with their private property. And so like, where is that balance of like, everybody has their own right to their property, versus this property is actually causing harm to other people that don't have any say in that kind of impact.

Do you have a clear line where that exists, Liz? Because I think that is— I mean, that is something we— I have heard. I previously did local economic development, but then just, you know, you spend a lot of time talking to other people from other communities, and that's such a challenge. Like, it's, it's their private investment, sure, but it's a public good because we all have to look at it and we're impacted by it, right? So, um, is that education just on the part of officials, like local, like local people that are kind of, that are responsible for these various things? Is that where you focus when you're trying to kind of educate about that line, knowing it's not clear, like line in the sand?

It's, yeah, it's not a clear line, and every community is different in terms of how far they want to push. What we found to be really effective is to develop a few case studies. So every local official has a handful of properties that their constituents are coming to saying like, you got to do something about this. Yeah, Councilmember X, it's probably entirely true.

There's like the frequent flyer properties that they're constantly getting calls about, or the police are constantly going to, which is another challenge, right?

Yeah. And so what we'll do with the community is we'll look at those example properties and we'll say, like, give us the data. Like, let's calculate the cost to the public of this property. Some of that is directly how delinquent is it in taxes, if it is. Commercial properties tend to pay their taxes more than residential properties because there's that asset in that commercial property, but not always. It could be tax delinquent. How, um, how often is the police coming? And can we get an estimated value of police call time to that property? Can we get an estimated value of fire service calls or any other public safety calls that are coming out to that property? And then if there are code, you know, violations that are pretty significant, there's a number of studies out there that measure the kind of indirect cost to neighboring properties if you have a kind of vacant, obviously deteriorating property. And then we can start to better understand, like, it's indirect costs, not just to the owners and their depreciating value, but to tax revenue, to a local government. If, like, its assessed values are being kept low because of this disinvestment, that directly impacts what local government can raise, and then they're more strained to provide the services that residents want, which is nice parks, paved streets, you know, the amenities that we all look for in a community that we're looking to move into or to stay in. And so that's really what we've seen be effective in trying to make that argument of like, folks do certainly have the ability to make decisions about their property, but once it starts impacting others on a greater scale, that helps to, um, to just provide some additional information for the conversation around why investing in some of these strategies and tools helps not just, you know, that property, but just the betterment of the community at large.

Right. Okay. What other— yeah. So what are some— what are some of the specific strategies like you've talked to? I mean, you've talked about them a little bit, but I'm even curious on— so I think we're still in the residential lane, right? Kind of talking about residential. I— and as I'm listening to you and I'm thinking about my community, I think an interesting challenge that I think we might have, it's less that our properties are vacant, vacant and the standards are declining, it's more likely that they're occupied and the standards are declining. And I think code enforcement— I just think code enforcement is a challenge. It's a challenge for people. So I'm wondering what advice you can give to any of the people that are responsible for these things, any advice you can give on how to approach it, especially if you've got very little in the way of code. Codes for residential properties especially.

Yeah, so code enforcement's a challenge. Um, it's also not, you know, it's historically really leaned on that enforcement piece of it, right? Whereas, yeah, which is a cost, um, and a legal cost as well. Um, and so we've actively been working with communities to think about like code, like what are, how are you going to reach compliance? And in the case where properties are occupied and they're deteriorating, that most often comes in the form of some type of home repair resources. And so like—

Like a fund?

Like a fund.

That people can apply to or low-interest loans or something like that?

Exactly. Yeah. A lot of communities leverage CDBG funding if they're an entitlement community or can get that directly from their county or the state. There's some states that have home repair funding. The state of Pennsylvania is a great example of it. They have a whole home repair fund that a lot of communities have gained access to, to do that type of repair. And sometimes communities, it's like they'll have a program where it's focused on like roof repairs, understanding that's a major kind of system that deteriorates, it's costly, folks can't afford to address it. Some communities do the more whole home repair approach where they're able to help less households, but they can ensure the property is stable and that it won't reach the point of being vacant or demolished in the future. Okay. And so, yep, that's, that's a critical piece to it, is just that funding. And it can be a challenge, right? Funding's, um, harder to come by these days. I know a lot of communities use their Rescue Act dollars for home repair, um, home repair grants and loans, etc., but that's ending, you know, at the end of this year. But there are other ways Communities are looking at it. Maybe they attach a fee to recording a deed that can then be put into a PAT to do home repair. It might be working with an affiliated Habitat for Humanity or working with kind of a regional level organization or government to address some of those issues. And so back when I worked in Pennsylvania, kind of after my East McKeesport, job, I went to a council of governments that served 20 municipalities in the region. Many of them had very limited code enforcement capacity, if at all. And so the, what the council of governments did is create a shared code enforcement program that was able to receive funding from the state and hire code enforcement officers that could work part-time capacity in a number of different communities, but were able to gain some of the skills necessary to do the job that, you know, probably one single community wouldn't have the resources to invest in that level of training. But that kind of like shared, shared resources and a position is helpful when thinking about places that don't have code enforcement. And then kind of the second part of your question is like, there might not even be ordinances on the books to allow—

probably, yeah. Yeah.

And so in some places, the kind of maximum might be a nuisance abatement where they demolish a property to do that work. And sometimes that's what has to happen. And it's important, like in those cases, to also then think about what comes next, because a demolition might take away the property, but then ultimately there's a vacant lot that needs to be maintained and ideally redeveloped if it can— if the community can support kind of that level of development activity.

The Growing Small Towns show is recorded locally at the Growing Small Towns podcast studio located in Oakes, North Dakota. It's produced by Pheasant Canteen Studio in Aberdeen, South Dakota, with marketing support from Cassidy Johnston in Canyon City, Colorado. Our intro music was created and produced exclusively for Growing Small Towns by James Bergman, singer and songwriter from Fargo, North Dakota. Local and small. It's what we support and it's who we love. Get your community a shout out on the podcast. Call 701-203-3337 and share your small town success that you just don't feel is being celebrated quite enough and let us shout you out. You can also share your biggest people challenge and we'll dedicate an episode to offering ideas to help. Hell, you can basically tell us anything and we'll do what we can to answer. We can't wait to hear from you. Right, right. Okay. I, I'm thinking it's interesting. We are, so I'm in North Dakota.

Mm-hmm.

Um, and our state government actually had a granting program where communities could apply to get to actually purchase dilapidated properties and then fully demo them, all grant dollar funded. So we were able to do that. I think we did 4 properties. So that, that was an incredible program in the sense that we could actually pay the landlord, we could pay the building owner, right? And obviously it was a little little tricky because it's really hard to even give grant money to something that, you know, you're just going to tear down. But it literally would have been an impediment to that person ever giving the property up.

Yeah.

You know, I mean, just giving up property is not something people are overly willing to do, even if their property is actually a detriment to the block that it's on or the neighborhood that it's in. So that was a really— that was a unique thing. And I'm not sure even where that funding came from at the state level. That was, that was a program that we were able to use. But short of that, you know, now those properties are owned by our economic development organization. Some of them have been sold off for redevelopment, but now they're just held. They're responsible for maintaining them. But, you know, it's, that's not a— it's much preferred to have an empty lot, truly, than actually damaged and disintegrating property.

So yeah, I mean, yeah, the harms of a disintegrating property, I mean, it just sends the signal that this is probably not a place worth investing in.

Right.

And yeah. And so, yeah, purchasing properties, especially commercial properties, is a strategy like somehow find what is that acquisition tool to get that property into the hands of folks that could at least hold it temporarily until a redevelopment or new use is determined that aligns in some way with a broader community vision. Provision, right? And so in a lot of places, we'll, we'll work with them on their delinquent tax foreclosure processes, understanding that that's a really powerful local government tool to compel the transfer of properties that are delinquent in taxes if there has been any, like, nuisance abatement or code enforcement actions on the property, to either ensure that owner kind of pays back the public for whatever's been invested, or they, you know, keep up with their responsibility of paying taxes in the community, and if not, kind of transferring it to an entity or an individual that can then, um, move forward in redeveloping it or minimally bringing it back up into healthy, safe standards.

As you're working with communities, Liz, are you finding that— is there typically an organization that's stepping in to make these purchases or is that just completely case by case? Because I think that's something too. Literally just this morning before you and I hopped on, I was recording a different podcast episode with a man that's been in economic development for so, so long in his small town. And their development company buys properties. Like, that's something that they do. That's one of the ways that the role they play in the market. It. Not every community does that, right? So I'm just wondering all the different things that you've seen. And if it's an individual, what does that even— what, how do you make that happen or support a community to make that happen, to make it available to a private investor? You know, like, what's the process for that? Because I'm just, I'm just curious what that really looks like, who these people are that are purchasing them.

Yeah, so in a lot of the communities that we work in, there might be a land bank, which is what I referenced earlier. So there's 18 states, I think more now, and the island of Puerto Rico that have these state-enabling land bank legislations. And those are the entities that are most often stepping in to acquire vacant properties that the market has kind of already ignored. Kind of understanding that like local governments typically aren't in a position to do that. That's— they have other functions that they need to deal with, limited budgets. So like being a landowner is not great. For local governments. Some states, they have really strong county improvement authorities that can serve in that role and are actively purchasing properties kind of ideally in coordination with the local government or the municipality that has identified some priority, priorities. We see a lot of kind of community development organizations stepping into that role and either purchasing properties or getting them through some type of judicial or tax sale process. And then, you know, the individuals— I, we don't really have that much experience on that like individual developer level, but they exist and they're doing it, and a lot of them are really skilled and can bring in some unique financing and capital to make projects work. Have, you know, relationships with CDFIs and are able to get funding sources kind of outside of the traditional banking institutions. But they exist in every community, right?

And that's just it. I think I was just wondering if there's— if as you've done this work, if you've been like, here's like a profile of a kind of person that rises to the top. Because we have— we've got people like that in our community, you know, individual developers that basically on their own have just gone out, secured these properties that are run down, falling apart, rehab them, and then flip flip them. That's fantastic, you know, that's like playing a really important part, and nobody officially had to encourage it. Like, that's just how they're behaving in the marketplace, which is fantastic. But yeah, for those, you know, for those people that don't have that, I wasn't sure if there was any method, you know. But it makes sense to me that you're kind of focusing on these potential agencies, organizations. You're kind of saying, okay, let's go, go down the list. Do you— does your community or region have this? Does it this? Does it have this?

In a lot of places it's like the accidental landlord, like they're— or like a religious institution that might be concerned about the properties that, you know, their congregation members have to walk past every day, and they might just step in and develop those skills along the way. It could be like an artist that has an interest in thinking creatively about how they, how they bring some, you know, renewed joy into their street, and it's like willing to take a risk and kind of just does that work. So yeah, they exist. And there's, there's organizations in some larger cities, there's JumpStart Philly, I'm thinking of specifically, and they've branched out to a few other cities, but that provide that training for kind of the individual level contractor developer to think about how to get those skills. I know that organization has supported a few of those conversations in Atlanta over the years. But yeah, it's, it's some of it is just like a willingness to take risk and be creative and kind of learn along the way. Um, when we're talking about vacant property challenges, there's often issues with like titles, tangled titles. Is it going to get insurance?

Right.

And so, um, just, uh, being able to navigate all of that either as a somebody who's professional who does it or is willing to just do that kind of learning in the process. Us. Um, but yeah, that's like a something in, in folks to get into that work.

Yeah. Do you— when you, um, I'm just thinking about the, the people in communities that might be listening to this. Is there— well, and I mean, I don't know what it— what is the opportunity for any of our listeners if they're in a position to like bring you to their communities? Will you go to any place in the United States?

Yeah. So I mean, our organization at Community Progress, we, we have technical assistance where we work directly with the community. We'll sit down, we definitely come to whoever we're partnering with, because it's so important to kind of visually see what's happening. But also just to be in conversation, like we were chatting of like, a lot of this is relationships and education and understanding and kind of dispelling some myths about what local government can and can't do based on the law. We often work in places where, you know, whatever's on the ordinance is not what's being actually implemented in practice given capacity constraints and kind of some unintended admin that might be needed. So yeah, so we, um, we work directly with places. We come, we'll maybe assess what you're currently doing, identify what the significant barriers are that exist, provide some ideas on, on how you might be able to kind of do some small reforms to your practice and/or some larger policy-level changes that might be needed from kind of the local ordinance level to even state policy. State policy often dictates what a community can and can't do with respects to property, and so there might be needed change across the state.

I'm wondering if, you know, as somebody listening to this, if they're thinking, we have a problem with vacant properties? Is there, as they're looking at both kind of their residential inventory and their commercial inventory, is there like a percentage of vacancy that should start to trigger a big problem? Is that something that you look at, or is it more of a gut feeling? You know what I mean? I'm just wondering, you know, if, if people are sitting here and they're trying to decide if they would reach out to you, in the show notes we'll have all the links to everything that you talked about, right? Is there kind of a point where you're like, you've got to do something or this is going to be— is that a thing? Like, yeah, percentage.

Yes, there is, totally. So, um, and the census has good, like, helpful information on that. Usually anything above, like, 6 to 7% of, like, it's this very specific census data point I'm going to give, but vacant other. So you're looking at, like, those are usually the properties that are they're residential, but that are vacant, and they're not vacant because they're seasonal or because of the natural turnover of properties. Like, it is natural to have a certain percentage of your— right, yeah, of your inventory to be vacancy. But yeah, anything in like the 6-7%, I see that, that you're concerned about. But I would say too, if it's, if it's not that high but it's really concentrated, like you have like a Main Street, for example. Yeah, Main Street where it's incredibly concentrated a neighborhood that might be a little isolated where it's concentrated. That is kind of the level that we work on. So we don't typically come to a community and like game plan around a specific parcel or a couple of parcels. It's more of like what, what's causing that kind of larger group of properties to be vacant and what from a systems level needs to change, either policy or practice. Say another just significant amount of challenge that we work with communities on, on that we haven't touched on directly, is brownfields. That's often— I know that's part of commercial, but kind of more that industrial side, because those are not just, you know, contaminant potential and risk potential, but they often are the most tricky for local governments and their partners to solve. And so thinking about kind of what what, what are the partnerships needed to either minimize that risk, find an entity that's willing to hold on to it, acquire it maybe with some level of protection to, to really get it cleaned up and kind of back into a productive space.

Okay, yeah. All right, what other strategies have we not discussed? We kind of started on just residential. Is there anything separate or unique or different that you would share on the commercial commercial side for all of our friends thinking about their Main Street buildings that are maybe sitting vacant presently?

Uh, yeah, on the commercial side, you know, the code enforcement and delinquent tax enforcement are not always as effective because folks do often pay their taxes. They might keep their property in an okay shape, and that's really where those kind of grants or, um, more of like affirmative tools need to come in place. So first, I think this— the same stands of like understanding what properties are vacancy, who owns them, and what their intention is, and then building strategies around those, um, those kind of specific scenarios. What's so challenging about commercial properties and the way that it's a little different from residential too is just the way that we consume goods and products has changed so much over the years. So while there's like challenges with rehabbing residential properties, that's tenfold in a commercial property, plus it needs to then generate that come back and support the rent payments that the owner has. And so we've seen in terms of like activating properties, a lot of really helpful engagement from the arts communities to do so. And I've listened to some of your past episodes and I know that's been highlighted, but just thinking creatively, and this is my pitch to local government of like leveraging the arts community in in the work of economic revitalization or community revitalization for pop-up exhibitions, and not just, you know, focusing on the artists, but like, what can you bring to bear during those events as a local government? Resources about entrepreneurial programs that you might have or that the state might have, or grant funding for startups or façade improvement programs. So thinking about ways that we can engage engage different stakeholders in the community on a really targeted approach is what we've seen be very helpful.

Can you give— do you have any specific concrete examples of unique engagement with arts? The arts? Yeah, because I just, I think, I always think if we can bring the arts, like, community, whatever that looks like in your town, um, into the conversation you're going to, you're going to try things you wouldn't have tried, and yeah, you're going to explore, you're going to explore ideas that probably wouldn't have been considered. That's— I totally agree that it's a super important, uh, piece to not, to not only not leave out but to prioritize.

Yeah, so, so one example, um, Tamaqua, Pennsylvania, they started with a campaign called Dear Tamaqua, and they had community members kind of write their— any thoughts they had about their town. And they put, they put like, um, coasters and bars, like they put these requests for folks to write things about their town all over town to get a variety of input of like what they wish.

Like a QR code? Was it a QR code that went to like just an open forum, or how did they, how did they do that?

Yeah, I don't— it was years ago, so, okay, so I— yeah, but they must have— it was— it must have been a survey related information. And I think some of it was just paper that they collected, kind of an older community. And I'll— yeah, this is an example I'll share with you, um, for folks to listen in to after. Um, so just like what they envisioned the town could be, what they miss about the town. It was kind of, you know, that like it's— the town is changing, not for the better. And so there was a lot of that kind of past nostalgia around the community. But what the leaders of this really wanted to showcase is just kind of where it could go and the vision for the community in the future. And then they did kind of a large-scale installation and showcased what every single person in the town said through this like months-long campaign. And some of it was really not good information, but I think just having the ability to have a voice and sharing, you know, you know, what they, what they missed and what they wanted the town to see. And it was kind of this community-wide gathering and arts installation kind of all in one where they got some, you know, sculptor artists to do some pieces of art, etc. And then kind of following that, they just took the examples of what, like, what they wanted the community to see and what the community members, you know, were interested in and really took it and ran with with it in terms of different kind of actual strategic planning that incorporated arts as the foundation for how they wanted to see the town move forward. And they did that in partnership with artists and paid them for that work, as all artists should be, to kind of be leaders in that space and continue on the community engagement strategy. And then, um, the organization ultimately started acquiring properties that were identified as places that community members wanted to see grow, particularly in their downtown. So they acquired a property that serves as kind of a venue space and an artist space for folks to engage in. They worked with an organization to acquire the property next door. It's a coffee shop. They actually employ folks that are in recovery, so giving them their first opportunity for employment kind of coming out of, of whatever treatment they were in, but just a really like community focused space. They've been acquiring a small park to recognize the kind of history of the town. So that's, that's kind of like the twofold is the vision, the strategy to implement it, and then the actual ownership of land and properties. And that's where some of the tools of like delinquent tax foreclosure and code enforcement can be really helpful when you have very derelict properties that are sitting empty, or it could just be that purchase that you, that you talked about of your economic development agency. Right. And I'll just share another, just an example too of kind of more of the residential side. There was an art installation in Albany and Schenectady and Troy, New York. And I cannot remember the artist's names, but I'll share it so that they get their proper credit. But it was called the Breathing Lights Campaign, and they did this really cool installation in these residential properties of like the properties kind of mimicking breath, like visually to showcase, um, kind of the— that properties were vacant but there's still life in them that could be brought back into them if there was the proper investment. And so those communities also have land banks that work really diligently on acquiring kind of the vacant residential property and, very innovative programs to, to make sure that they become homeownership opportunities for the community members in those places. So one of the benefits of a land bank owning a property versus maybe a local government or a redevelopment authority is there's flexibility as to who they could sell that property to in a way that local governments may not have that kind of level of flexibility. Ability, and they have to send it to that or sell it to the highest bidder, for example.

Right, right, right. Okay. Oh, such good stuff. Like, it's, it's, um, I think the thing I love about everything you're sharing is that I feel like you've worked with enough communities and seen enough situations where you've probably heard every— and I don't want to call them excuses, but that's kind of what it comes down to, right? Is just, but we can't do this and we can't do that. And it's, it's this mindset of it's hard, right? Again, it's that walking that line of private, private ownership versus public good. And how do you, how do you walk that in a way that honors people's private investment but acknowledges the fact that this is making the, the lack of care, concern, investment in this thing is making our community worse, right? And so I would guess that you've kind of heard everything under the sun. Um, and so is there anything we haven't touched on that you've seen, that you've experienced, that you've heard from any of the communities that you've worked with?

Yeah, I think that, um, so yes, we've heard everything under the sun. Every, every community— and we've worked in, gosh, hundreds of communities across the country— um, every community has their own personality, right? And personalities of like who's, who's in positions who's owning properties, etc. And so a lot of it's navigating that. I'll say our organization, in whatever capacity that we're engaged in a place, we always want to meet with the folks that are the potential barriers or the, you know, the most significant naysayers to change, to really get their perspective and to understand that, but also ideally get their buy-in to whatever whatever could be helpful, but minimally just understand that, you know, their, um, what they've shared is part of the larger story, even if it might not align with what should be happening moving forward. And so that's what I would share of like, don't ignore the folks that are the barriers because there could be something to learn from them, but it's also important to engage those folks in conversation.

Yeah, I think being realistic about what your expectation of that engagement is is a really important thing. Right.

Yeah.

But I love how you just worded that as something I've never heard anybody say, but that all of those narratives, even the ones that we perceive to be quote unquote negative, are part of a larger story. And that's a really beautiful way to put it. And so we have to acknowledge them because Because again, unfortunately, people that are in strong opposition to something like change, progress, sometimes just they don't like what's being proposed. The more they feel like nobody is listening to them, a lot of times the louder that they get and the harder it becomes to engage them down the road. And then feelings get hurt and conflicts arise. Like, it can get really So recognizing that, knowing that the goal is to engage them, actually listen to them and try to understand where they're coming from. And at the end of the day, you may not, and it's still the right thing to do because they live here too, right? Like, I think that's one of the hardest parts about public sector work is just, is just managing all of those kinds of needs, perspectives, opinions about where we should go or You know, it's— but it's really important. So I think it's great that you, that you see it that way and encourage communities to do it because it's not easy.

Yeah. And really, like, when there's large-scale vacancy or a Main Street's experiencing significant vacancy, it takes just a really coordinated approach. And so understanding how these different tools, different stakeholders, different investments all work together is really important. And I'll just share an example from upstate New York, Ogdensburg, about 10,000 folks, of like really understanding their challenges of vacancy and reviewing their tax foreclosure process where they kind of shifted away from a tax lien sale, which kind of removes a lot of authority local government has over properties, and moved to a judicial interim foreclosure sale, which gave the town a little bit more more, um, uh, was able to like acquire and then foreclose and then take ownership of property. And in doing this, they were able to set up a system with their land bank to acquire those properties, were able to get millions of dollars from philanthropic organizations. And I think that's a big part of this work too, is like thinking about what economic development or conservation work or home rehab is connected to different philanthropic agencies' goals. And so part of it's on us to reframe how we talk about the work, like, right, in terms of like healthy outcomes, in terms of quality affordable homeownership for folks, which is a significant need of— and so thinking about like rephrasing our work to so that it does fit other narratives, because ultimately it's achieving those goals anyways. We on the kind of development side might not necessarily always be thinking in those lenses. But in the case of Ogdensburg too, they also brought in their BOCES program and created an opportunity for students to actually learn carpentry and development skills, which is so needed in a lot of the communities that we work in, especially smaller communities when they say like, we don't have enough contractors or developers with the level of skill set to actually even do the repairs that are needed. And so thinking about how can, how can the funding be coalesced with the job retention needs of a community to also then address these challenging properties that are vacant, right?

Yep. So smart. Okay, Liz. Well, what else? What else do we need to know about working with your organization.

Yeah, well, if I could do a just a quick plug about some things that we have coming up too.

Great.

Um, so we're going to be hosting our flagship conference in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania this September, um, the 22nd through the 25th, and it brings together about 1,000 practitioners that are really dedicated to figuring out solutions to vacant and abandoned properties, um, across the country and from all different community sizes in shape. So it's a really fun event, but also incredibly informative to hear, you know, really great kind of best practices and example, example case studies from across the country. We also have a webinar series. It's free. It's monthly. The March webinar, it's on March 26th, it's gonna be focused on a property condition survey. So like, how can communities get that initial foundational understanding of the vacancy challenges in their town? Down and give an example. And then on the technical assistance side, if anything that I shared resonates with your listeners, they're welcome to reach out to me. I'm happy to talk about how we might be able to support their communities, or minimally just have a conversation and point them to additional resources or, you know, publications that we've done that might be helpful to, to read up on and get introduced to.

Yeah, that's fantastic, Liz, because I think, I I think the reason this intrigued me, um, when you came into my inbox is, is the fact that like technical assistance is something that really can support small communities in a meaningful way, right? Where you maybe, maybe you don't have anybody that's paid to do any of this, you know, all of your city council, your mayor, you're, you know, if you have an economic development group at all, it, they might all be volunteer. Um, and so there's— it's also then how do they go about getting the skills to know how to do these things? You know, attending your conference sounds amazing. A lot of people aren't going to fund their own way to that necessarily, you know. So I just think it's so valuable to be connected to you, knowing that there's people that are absolutely struggling with this. Any community that had, like we talked earlier, um, kind of one of those catalyzing events where maybe a massive employer left, and suddenly you're dealing with kind of a large number of vacant either residential properties or commercial buildings. It's just— and it can— I, I think, I would guess that it can kind of feel like a, like a snowball that's gaining momentum and you just can't stop it and you don't know how. And so having access to you guys is going to be really valuable. I know that there's going to be people that'll reach out to you from this episode. Um, so thank you so much for joining us. Thank you so much for sharing the information. Everything you share that has a link associated with it. This, this show set of show notes will be kind of packed with stuff, which is totally okay. But please make sure you send us everything we need for your webinar series, obviously your event, and then all the ways to contact you too, because I have a feeling a lot of people will have questions for you.

Yeah, I'll just add one last plug for our conference. Attending conferences is incredibly expensive. We know that we have scholarship opportunities. Communities too, and we do prioritize participants from lower resource communities. So if you're interested, be on the lookout for those, and hopefully there's an opportunity to meet, meet your listeners there.

Yeah, fantastic. Thank you so much, Liz. I hope our—

thanks for having me, Rebecca.

Have a great day.

You too.

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