Community and Economic Development Director Miles Brainard says the home in the 1800 block of 32nd Street was built 100 years ago, and had been vacant for several years. The city used a state grant of 40,000 dollars, and 120,000 from its Community Development Block Grant funds.
“What we want is to take our aging housing stock which still often has good bones and give it a facelift. In that way we help to solidify our tax base and make sure that we maintain the strength of our neighborhoods.”
The home will soon be put on the market, listed at 130,000 dollars.
In the future, he hopes the program will, in his words, "be more strategic."
“The ideal candidate is a house that’s been sitting vacant for a while, caught in the cycle of abandonment, but isn’t too far gone, in a neighborhood that’s in a similar sort of condition, kind of on the cusp, it could go one way or the other. And we’re going to grab it and make an impression before it goes too far down the tubes.”
Brainard says this is the second house fixed up for Rock Island's Urban Homesteading program. City staff will now evaluate the results, and possibly ask the city council for its approval to continue the program later this year.
He hopes it will soon be able to fix up one to two houses each year.