All around the Inner Harbor signs of revitalization abound. Million-dollar-plus condominiums abut those close to that mark. Tiny row houses that sold for less than $100,000 five years ago in areas close to downtown like Locust Point top $250,000.
Cranes dot the landscape and the census shows flight from the city has abated.
Rising interest rates and stabilizing and falling home prices in recent months could squash the real estate boom. But some areas of Baltimore never participated in it. Less than a mile away from the Inner Harbor, blight has ruled ? and continues to spread.
This, despite a vigorous campaign by Mayor Martin O?Malley to buy vacant and abandoned homes and sell them to investors and civic groups for development. According to Baltimore Housing, the city has bought 6,144 properties under O?Malley?s Project 5,000. That is a noble achievement.
But the number of vacant and abandoned buildings keeps rising, providing havens for drug dealers, users and prostitutes. In August of 2000 the tally of vacant building notices issued by the city was 12,178. As of last month, there were 16,151.
The director of communications for Baltimore Housing, David Tillman, said the number of building permits better reflects the state of housing. Those figures show how much is being improved, he said. That figure has almost doubled from 2000 to 2006 to 38,796.
While that is good news, it does not remove the fact that more buildings are sitting vacant than before. And they create a danger to nearby residents, as many collapse before they can be rehabbed or razed.
So what will work?
Mike Mitchell, who is on hiatus as executive director of Chesapeake Habitat for Humanity to run for state delegate, suggests lowering property taxes to lure homeowners to the city and to prevent others from fleeing. Currently, the taxes stand double those of surrounding counties.
We think you would agree that this is a great idea and something Mayor O?Malley must seek to change regardless of the current election. The influx of people that lower taxes would bring to the city would raise city tax revenue.
That means more money to improve schools and police and other city services that would help to make city living more attractive. It would also help those on fixed incomes better manage skyrocketing home values.
This may lower tax revenue in the short term, but will increase it long- term as the tax base expands. To finance any revenue gap cutting taxes might cause, the city has ample room to eliminate members of the bloated public school administrative bureaucracy. They drive education costs per pupil to about $12,000 per student ? more than twice that of most local private schools.
To ensure that homeownership is available to not just the privileged ? a pillar of O?Malley?s gubernatorial campaign ? he could slash prices on homes the city sells to Habitat or, better yet, give abandoned homes to them to rehab.
The Inner Harbor and its environs must not turn into a segregated enclave of the rich while the rest of the city crumbles.
