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Who holds the reins of power in Toledo?
While power exists in many forms and is diffused over many
groups and their networks, one usually expects to find power
located in institutions dominated or controlled by “elites.”
Yet, it is an informally organized group of women,
predominantly black, and united through a common economic
plight, that is exerting pressure on local “influential
decision makers” to act in the group’s best interest.
The women entered into agreements with the now defunct
Toledo Community Development Corp. (TCDC) that abruptly
closed its doors several months ago without notice. The
contracts provided the residents of the 80 unit Oakwood I
and II tax credit housing development, with an option to
purchase their homes in year 16 if they rented and stayed in
the homes for 15 years.
TCDC’s
sudden demise left $230,000 in unpaid property taxes. As a
result, the remaining 43 homes still standing or occupied
were forced into foreclosure by the Lucas County Land Bank.
The
residents, many of whom loudly accuse the elites of
conspiracy, have responded by obtaining legal services from
Advocates for Basic Legal Equality (ABLE). Nearly 20
meetings have taken place among various interested parties
over the past six months.
With a
mayoral election and six at-large city council seats up for
grabs in 2017, the ladies’ actions have certainly gotten the
attention of City Hall and the Lucas County Land Bank.
“We are
working with the residents and the Land Bank to ensure that
they keep their homes,” said Mayor Paula Hicks-Hudson,
speaking of an ordinance approved unanimously by city
council this past summer.
The plan
enlisted the assistance of the Lucas County Treasurer’s
office to foreclose on the properties in order to have them
pass through the Land Bank. The maneuver would totally wipe
away the delinquent taxes plus additional liens of
approximately $700,000. The Land Bank, according to Lucas
County Treasurer and Land Bank Chairman Wade Kapszukiewicz
“would only own it for 5.5 seconds, only long enough to pass
it along to a CDC, who hopefully can make good on the
promise that was made to the residents, and that is to
provide a path to ownership and to have a responsible
property manager.”
That
“responsible property manager” appears to be NeighborWorks,
a CDC with headquarters in East Toledo and led by Bill
Farnsel. Several sources, unwilling to be identified, are
skeptical of Farnsel’s motives and critical of his cultural
competence and racial sensitivities. The plan calls for
NeighborWorks to sell the properties to the residents for
$20,000 and funds to make roof or other major repairs.
NeighborWorks appears to be the only local organization with
the capacity to provide unconventional mortgage financing
and the property management needed. The residents,
meanwhile, having gone through several previous property
managers, are understandably angry and feel as if they have
been lied to far too many times.
Will the
women be exploited?
The
situation must be continuously monitored and monitored very
closely.
Yet the
good news is that the women’s anger has catalyzed power in
unlikely places. The power among economically challenged
women has also been leveraged to obtain critical and
outspoken support from city councilwomen such as Yvonne
Harper and Cecelia Adams, PhD.
“…. I deal with whatever
is in writing that was agreed upon,” says Adams. “If people
put some money and so forth into properties that they didn’t
yet own, and were told that what they were paying in 15
years they could somehow apply all or some portion to own
it, then I think that if they have stuck it out, somebody
ought to give them a chance to do exactly that.
“We can’t keep blocking
every opportunity that people have and then not making good
on promises. If you make a promise, then you ought to keep a
promise. My gut reaction is how can we help them stay in
their properties and improve them and help them have the
home ownership that they obviously want.
“These are women who are
out there struggling by themselves with children and I get
so angry that women have to struggle so hard and men in the
community have to stand up for them and with them, and the
women who have some position and power to do so, should
too.”
Contact Rev. Donald Perryman, D.Min, at
drdlperryman@centerofhopebaptist.org
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