For those of you who may have missed it, both Channel 5 and Channel 9 covered SUN’s hot meeting on vacant houses on their 11 P.M. newscasts. Link on to their stories on the internet (channel 9 even has the newscast video):
Neighbors Demand Mass-Demolitions
Channel 5 WTVH 4/28/08
Louise Thompson, a member of SUN’s Southside Coalition, led off a
parade of neighborhood residents telling city
officials their stories, mostly horror stories, about living around
vacant houses. For over a half hour, resident after
resident spoke about the problems their families confront in the face
of vacant and abandoned buildings.
On Louise’s short block, almost half of the houses have become
vacant. Across our neighborhoods gangs stash
drugs in the overgrowth and under the siding of the houses. Trash
and debris is mysteriously dumped late at night.
Loiterers blast loud music, fight, cause property damage and urinate
on adjoining houses. Homeowners find it hard
to get insurance and see their home’s value decline.
The meeting last night focused attention on the worst of the houses,
the vacants that are beyond saving and need to
be demolished. SUN will host a second meeting on May 29th at 7 PM at
Most Holy Rosary church to discuss how the
city can encourage both non-profits and private investors to
rehabilitate vacant houses and increase owner-occupancy
in our neighborhoods.
Over 70 SUN members from the south, southwest and near-west sides of
the city packed the basement hall at St. Anthony’s Church to discuss the ever increasing number of vacant houses in our neighborhoods.
SUN’s Housing Leadership Team (l-r) Sabrina Rautio, Brenda Williams,
Olga Podolak, Ann Reynolds and Carolyn Stanley chaired the meeting.
The night’s topic focused on how the city can improve its record on taking
down dangerous houses in SUN’s neighborhoods. Attending the meeting
for the city were Director of Operations Tim Carroll, the city’s top lawyer
Rory McMahon and director of Code Enforcement Jim Blakeman.
SUN won three major concessions from the city. SUN will be included
in quarterly meetings with the city to determine the vacant houses taken to state Supreme Court for potential demolition. The nine vacant houses on the 200 block of Fitch Street will receive priority attention for demolition and inclusion in the new investor rehab program. The city agreed to participate in a meeting with SUN and state officials to discuss training city staff to certify historic properties.
The longtime community newspaper, The Constitution/Urban CNY wrote its most recent cover story on the problem of vacant houses and SUN’s upcoming public meetings designed to pressure City Hall into action.
Editor and article writer Ken Jackson wrote:
“After the announcement of the Mayors’ new housing initiative there were those who thought it was a move in the right direction however those who inhabit some of the cities most challenged neighborhoods are responding with dismay. Syracuse United Neighbors, a neighborhood community advocacy group, staged a spirited protest on the steps of Syracuse’s City Hall against the seemingly endless list of dilapidated abandoned structures.”
Come on out to the meeting on Monday April 28th at 7 PM at St. Anthony’s Church Hall 1515 Midland Ave. The meeting will focus on demolitions. Next month, a second meeting will focus on rehabbing vacant houses for owner-occupancy.
15 SUN members and staff attended the 36th annual National People’s
Action conference
in Washington, DC April 12-14th. The big issue for SUN, as well as
for over 500
grassroots neighborhood leaders from across the country was to stem
the tide of mortgage
foreclosures that are hitting our neighborhoods.
SUN and NPA were busy this weekend. Protests at the White House, the
Federal Reserve
and the home of Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke all demanded
the same thing:
work as hard to help the homeowners and neighborhoods, as you did
when you bailed
out Wall St. investment bankers and hedge fund managers.
The crowd pictured below is talking with a top aide to Federal
Reserve chair Bernanke
on the front steps of the Fed. As a result of our protests, the Fed
has agreed to schedule
a meeting representatives from NPA affiliated groups.
SUN member Peter Polikarpenko is pictured at a protest organized by
National People’s Action in
Washington, D.C. on April 14th. Groups gathered in front of the
Department of Housing and Urban
Development and demanded to speak with the acting director of HUD,
former Syracuse mayor
Roy Bernardi.
Bernardi’s chief aide (former Syracusan Jim Parenti) came down and
talked with the group’s leaders.
National People’s Action has several major demands for HUD:
An immediate moratorium on public housing demolitions.
Create a plan for the future of low-income public housing.
Reverse plans to take away the rights of tenants to have a voice in
public housing policy.

At the National People’s Action conference held April 12-14 in
Washington, D.C.
SUN folks participated in protests that focused attention on the
mortgage foreclosure
crisis that is causing families to lose their homes and neighborhoods
being hit with
large numbers of vacant and abandoned houses.
Pictured on the bus heading to a protest at the home of Federal
Reserve Chairman
Ben Bernanke are Mercedes Bloodworth, Eddie H. Brown, Brenda Williams,
Barbara Devoise and Shaniqua Stanley.
Here’s some of the coverage of SUN’s April Fool’s Day press conference at City Hall. SUN leaders announced our plans to hold two large Town Hall meetings to discuss the problems our neighborhoods face because of the large number of vacant and abandoned houses on our blocks. The first meeting will be held on April 28th at 7 PM at St. Anthony’s church 1515 Midland Ave.
Vacant Housing Crisis
WTVH-5 4/1/08
Sabrina Rautio, Louise Thompson, Olga Podolak and Carolyn Stanley
chat with a member of the city’s Division of Code
Enforcement. SUN delivered an invitation to Director Jim Blakeman to
attend our public Town Hall meeting on vacant
houses. The meeting will be held on Monday April 28th at 7 P.M. at
St. Anthony’s Church Hall 1515 Midland Ave.
We let Code Enforcement know that if they had trouble finding the
hall, it’s the church across the street from the nine
boarded up houses in the two surrounding blocks (oh, and five vacant
lots where houses were demolished.)
Johnny Cannon, Carolyn Stanley, Ann Reynolds and Sabrina Rautio were
among the crowd that delivered invitations to
Mayor Driscoll and City Attorney Rory McMahon to SUN’s upcoming
public Town Hall meeting on vacant houses.
Director of Operations Tim Carroll is shown here accepting the
invitations, as well as getting an earful about the problems
vacant houses are causing in our neighborhoods.
The meeting will be held on Monday April 28th at 7 PM in the St.
Anthony’s Church Hall, 1515 Midland Ave.
