Pittsburgh Post-Gazette from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania • Page 19

UTY NEIGHBORHOODS PITTSBURGH POST-GAZETTE MONDAY, NOVEMBER 30, 1998 B-3 CITYSCAPE it iy f-. 'rr' Tit kr. Sjj "4i s--, Community leaders hope this Larimer mural signals that better days are ahead for the neighborhood. A plan for Larimer's future calls for a focus on housing and making visible improvements to the community. Peter M.

Larimer's old guard airs concerns longtime member of the Silver Lake Community Improvement Association, founded in 1950. One of the boys he took hunting years ago, Arnold Perry, has grown up to be a youth counselor and president of the association. Rose is retired from Westing-house Electric where he installed elevators. He spends his time hunting, fishing and, back here, watching life go by. He doesn't like a lot of what he sees.

He blames what he sees as sources of the problems racism, neglect, corruption and he blames the failure of individuals in the community to combat the problems they face. "The old people have passed the problems to the kids," Rose said. "They couldn't solve them and they passed them along. And now with crack cocaine, Larimer Avenue is By Lillian Thomas Post-Gazette Staff Writer James Rose surveys Larimer from a stoop near where Orphan and Hooker streets run into Larimer Avenue. The 70-year-old ex-MP is tall, a ball cap shading an unblinking gaze above a steel-gray goatee.

He wears camouflage pants, army boots, a jacket with North American Hunting Club insignia and a stud in his ear. He's lived in or around Larimer for much of his life. "Tree!" the steady flow of customers in and out of a small store there greet him. The nickname comes from "Big Tree," his CB handle. He knows just about everyone going up and down the avenue: the wife of the owner of Pirollo Transport Co.

across the street who Eulls up in the company lot in a lack Mercedes; the jitney driver; the guv who's living out of his car; the fids who are on crack and those who aren't. Rose has been an unofficial godfather in the neighborhood, teaching kids to hunt and fish. He's a oing oacKwaras. uracK cocaine is estrovine black men and thev don't have the sense to know it." He's heard about the Larimer Community Plan that's been put together. He's not impressed.

ClTYWIDE Playground update The city Department of Engineering and Construction and its contractors are completing work on the last of 20 neighborhood playgrounds that received major renovation this year, 14 more on this year's schedule won't be finished until 1999. Fencing around the Sterrett School playground in Point Breeze will be removed this week to mark its readiness, and the second phase of work on the Shaler playground in Duquesne Heights is expected to be completed next week, said Bruce Padolf, the department's project manager of architecture. Those two sites represent the last work of a busy season in trying to fulfill a five-year commitment that Mayor Murphy made in 1996 to ensure every city playground has modern safety surfacing and equipment. The improvements are far more than other recent city administrations attempted, but the city is also six months to a year behind its schedule on many projects. Construction has begun on these seven playgrounds originally scheduled for 1998 but now to be completed in the spring: McBride Park in Lincoln Place Tropical in Beechview Chartiers Wabash in the West End Esplen, relocated from St Vincent Church property Niagara in South Oakland Crescent School in Homewood Construction is to begin in spring or summer on these other seven playground projects postponed from this year, Padolf said: Abel Long in Beechview Dinan in Stanton Heights Garfield Dallas in Homewood Garland in East Liberty Tustin in Soho Frick Park Beechwood Boulevard site "There's a variety of reasons for delay.

Each one has maybe a different one," Padolf said, citing examples such as land acquisition issues to expand or move sites, equipment purchases that were dependent on special grants, and design requirements for large playgrounds. Nine other playgrounds are scheduled for 1999 renovation, but Padolf said they will depend on City Council approval of capital budget funding. Those are: Banksville Park Vanucci in Beechview McGunnegle in Beechview Woods Run Crafton Heights playground in Crafton Heights Stratmore in Crafton Heights Philip Murray School in Mount Oliver SheradenPark Quarry in South Side Slopes The 18 renovation projects already completed this year, aside from smaller playground repairs that the Department of Public Works accomplished included Leslie in Lawrenceville; Oakwood; Lookout in Troy Hill; the Frick Park Braddock Avenue site; Foresi-deVine in the Lower Hill; Martin Luther King Jr. and West Park Deer Pit, both on the lower North Side; Jefferson in Central North Side; Fowler and CrossStrauss, both in Perry South; Manchester School, Manchester Park and McKnight, all in Manchester; Vin-cennes and Granville, both in the Hill District; Spring Garden School; Boundary Street in Oakland; and Paulson in North Homewood. Hill District Allequippa Terrace face lift Work is progressing on a huge makeover of Allequippa Terrace, a public housing project on the border of the Hill District and west Oakland.

Site preparation work has begun on a hilltop cul-de-sac on Allequippa Street, where former buildings nave been torn down and 52 new townhouses and 106 apartments are planned. Also last week, the city Planning Commission heard plans for a second phase of work, 146 new units along Burrows Street 55 town-houses and three apartment buildings of four stories each. The second phase also includes 265 parking spaces in off-street lots and along the street. The new structures in Phase will have exteriors that combine brick, stucco and vinyl siding. When the Allequippa Terrace revisions are completed in several years, the density of the housing project will be significantly reduced, to 1,227 units from 1,700 units.

Nearly 500 older, dilapidated units have been razed and won't be rebuilt The new total of housing units will include 700 apartments, 425 townhouses and 102 of the former units that have been renovated. East Liberty Bike trail ribbon-cutting The place that inspired angst and hope in neophyte drivers will be ready for a new set of wheels tomorrow. The former driver's license testing center course on Washington Boulevard near the Highland Park Bridge has been converted to a bicycle criterium course. The half-mile course, where nervous teens cruised the circle trying out their turn signals, will open as a velodrome that bicycle organizations will use for criterium course races. There, serious bicyclists will see how fast they can go to maintain a high ranking in the local cycling community.

A criterium is a short course bicycle race 20 to 30 miles long usually conducted on city streets. Because the course is short, spectators can see the cyclists numerous times during a race. City officials emphasized the course will be open to bicyclists of all ability levels. When bike racers and riders aren't using it, the course may be used for in-line skating. The course's ribbon-cutting ceremony will be at 4 p.m.

South Side Tubman Guild anniversary The Harriet Tubman Guild sponsors of Harriet Tubman Terrace at 550 Negley Run will celebrate its 83rd anniversary of service at its annual Queen Luncheon Saturday. The luncheon will be at the Sheraton Hotel Station Square from noon to 3 p.m. The guild manages the first apartment building in Pittsburgh to be built on urban renewal land and sold to black buyers. It's also the first to have government subsidies for those unable to pay rent The building was dedicated in June 1970. ClTYWIDE HUD appoints new leaders U.S Housing and Urban Development Secretary Andrew Cuomo is appointing three Community Builders to Pittsburgh's HUD office as part of a new Urban Peace Corps to revitalize America's cities.

Community Builders are experienced professionals who will spend the next two years working in HUD's 81 field offices. The Pittsburgh appointees are Donna Chernoff, former executive director of the Fair Housing Partnership of Pittsburgh and a former project director with the Urban League of Pittsburgh; Cynthia Haines, former executive director of Bridge to Independence who has led several drug and alcohol abuse prevention initiatives; and Mark Minnerly, a graduate of Cornell University and co-founder of the school's summer college minority scholarship fund, who has 10 years' experience in community development. About 8,500 people applied for the 217 Community Builders positions in the nation. The appointees will serve two-year terms but may be asked to stay on when their terms end. Downtown Judge to be honored The Family Law Section of the Allegheny County Bar Association will celebrate the career of senior Judge Lawrence W.

Kaplan with a reception Thursday. It will be the second honor for the Allegheny County Common Pleas judge in recent months. In September, the Domestic Relations Association of Pennsylvania gave him its lifetime achievement award. The Domestic Relations Association has granted the lifetime award only seven times in its 32-year history. The group represents professional employees in the state's family courts.

Kaplan was appointed to the bench in 1978 and elected for his first 10-year term in 1979. He was re-elected in 1989 and assumed senior judge status last year. He continues to serve in the adult and juvenile sections of the court's Family Division. He has lectured on domestic relations law for several organizations, including the National Child Support Enforcement Association. His articles on family law have been published in several legal journals, including The Family Advocate.

The Children's Rights Council gave him the Chief Justice Warren E. Burger "healer" Award in 1993 for his national leadership in family law. The bar association reception for Kaplan will be from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. at the Top of The Triangle, Downtown. Housing, investing key to reviving Larimer "The amount of land owned outside the private realm is staggering, and the potential impact this has on Larimer's future is uncertain.

Larimer Community Plan report BorshPost Gazette Rose and Perry think the community must look within itself. They are pessimistic about the prospects for change, skeptical of local, leaders. "It's in the hands of the community itself. We can't wait no more. We've asked for help.

We aren't asking anymore. We find it difficult to believe in the city and the powers that be," Perry said. The Silver Lake association is all-volunteer and, at about 30 members, too small to make much of a dent. But members cut grass for residents, do cleanups and patrol neighborhoods. What makes people stay despite their anger and frustration over the deterioration of the community? "It's my neighborhood," Rose said.

Perry responded quietly. "When you're hardest hit, don't you quit. There's no quit in me," he said. "We don't have too many options here. But there are very beautiful people here.

We fight to make the good things survive." Some preliminary proposals from Capital Asset caused concern for exactly that reason, he said. "They were just preliminary ideas, but people in the community were concerned; we were concerned," St John said. Since then, he said, there have been more discussions and he is hopeful about the prospects. Dwayne Woodruff, regional vice president of Capital Asset, said the firm was planning to work closely with the community. "Obviously we're not a development company.

We purchase and service tax liens," he said. "There are occasions where Capital Asset is more than happy to assist in the development of properties, but we don't want to get in a situation with a city or other community where we come in and become a landholder for a big portion of a community." Capital Asset is working on plans to develop properties in Homewood, Woodruff said, and that project could serve as a model. It will work with community groups and use local contractors in such projects, he said. The Larimer plan concludes with proposals for a strategy, expected to take 10 years, to first stabilize the community, then bring in development. Stabilization includes cleanup, trying to encourage home improvement and home buying, and seeking to decrease crime.

The plan calls housing "the heart of the redevelopment strategy recommendations." It seeks to increase owner occupancy from 29.7 percent to 40 percent by 2009, decrease high density public housing and develop new housing. It recommends focusing efforts on "visible" areas: "When a neighborhood actively takes steps to change its image, it must advertise that change. Accomplishing this task is easier if development initiatives are visible to those who pass by, but not through, the neighborhood." Targeted areas include East Liberty Boulevard, especially the neighborhood "entrance" at East Liberty and Larimer, Lincoln Avenue and the Meadow Street Bridge. The plan doesn't talk money how much this would cost and who might pay. For now, the organizations involved plan to seek funding for staffing and, of course, more studies and detailed plans.

The "critical mass" of development sought sounds to Rose like a plan to squeeze out current residents, either by knocking down their housing or putting in housing they can't afford. Perry, 47, says that the real causes of Larimer's problems are not being acknowledged: red-lining, neglect by the city and police, a refusal to tackle unemployment. And he sees the strategy of housing first as backward. "First you bring in light industry; housing follows. That's the way it happens in successful communities I've seen," Perry said.

"You don't bring in housing the people here can't afford and that no one else wants because there's no reason to be here." He's contemptuous of the effort to create "visible" improvements. "Visible to whites who drive by and don't want to see black men? To heck with perception. Build where it's most instrumental for the community. Bring in industry and the people who work there will be able to buy homes," he said. ter of circumstances that led to the decline of many city neighborhoods: population loss, job losses during the dismantling of the steel industry, declining home values.

Then Larimer got hit by a force that turned slow decline into free fall: gang warfare. The Larimer Avenue Wilkmsburg, or gang was dominant in the late '80s andearly '90s, giving the neighborhood a reputation that persists both within and outside the community today. Crime has decreased sharply since 1993, according to the city's Department of Public Safety figures. But drugs and gangs are still a problem, and as crime has decreased citywide, Larimer still ranks high among city neighborhoods. One of the objectives of the plan is to combat both the crime and the negative image it creates.

The heavy percentage of land not controlled by those in the community is a cause for concern. "The amount of land owned outside the private realm is staggering, and the potential impact this has on Larimer's future is uncertain," the report says. The Urban Redevelopment Authority and the city, county and school district "have a long history of working with community organizations to carry out sound strategic plans," and thus are not of so much concern, but "the uncertainty of Capital Asset's intentions is much more serious." Capital Asset has foreclosed on a number of properties, and the large number of liens it holds means it could become a large property owner in Larimer, St. John said. "There is the potential that they could become a positive factor" in Larimer's future by becoming a partner with the community and other entities in developing the neighborhood, St.

John said. "But it could be negative if they don't do development of sufficient quality to attract further development" By Lillian Thomas Post-Gazette Staff Writer Larimer doesn't look much like a community with a plan, but there is one now. And although the Larimer Community Plan has plenty of development jargon and ambitious scenarios, parts of it are bluntly worded, unsparing assessments of the neighborhood. On the physical environment: "A drive down almost any street in Larimer provides strong signals of systematic disinvestment. Even in the strongest blocks, vacant lots can be found where a house once stood.

Many of these lots are overgrown with weeds and do nothing more than collect trash." On crime: "Since 1993 there has been a dramatic decrease in violent and misdemeanor crime. Yet many residents will tell you that they are still fearful to travel the streets of Larimer. Open drug markets operate around the clock." On demographics: In addition to a 33 percent population loss between 1980 and 1997, "Larimer is a community of the very old and the very young, with few in the middle to support the needs of both ends of this spectrum." The plan also points out that Larimer has a very low owner occupancy rate 39 percent compared with the citywide rate of 52.3 percent that it has lost much of its retail and commercial business base, and that more than 45 percent of the land parcels in Larimer are not owned by private citizens they are either publicly owned or are among the properties with liens on them held by Capital Asset Research the Florida-based company that bought the city's liens. The candid acknowledgment of the community's problems was "one of the things that was important in the study," said Richard St John, executive director of the Community Design Center, which provided a $9,000 grant last year for the study. Those involved felt, "let's be clear about what the negatives are so we can begin planning from a reality base," St.

John said. The plan also lists community strengths and plans for building on them, including light industry and retaining businesses, access to transportation, strong churches and land available for development The strategies to improve things focus on housing and making visible improvements at the community's edges, where they will be noticed and can begin a process of changing the negative image of the neighborhood. The proposals are wide-ranging and extremely ambitious, seeking to put together a "critical mass a combination of enough investment in new housing, businesses, green spaces and infrastructure improvements so that, in essence, a new community is rebuilt." The effort to create the plan started with East Liberty Concerned Citizens which enlisted the help of the city Planning Department and the Community Design Center, a nonprofit organization that works to help communities make improvements that will encourage reinvestment. Steven G. Hawkins Architects did an "environmental scan," Real Estate Strategies conducted a residential market study and a series of community meetings was held.

Larimer is one of Pittsburgh's so-near-yet-so-far neighborhoods, snug up against Highland Park and Lincoln-Lemington on a map, but actually cut off from those neighborhoods by the deep ravines where Negley Run and Washington Boulevard run. You can't see into Larimer from most of the streets along its edges, you have to cross a bridge to get in from most neighboring areas, and once in, streets tend to deadend where the land drops off steeply. It was once an Italian community, settled late in the 19th century by immigrants. Many of the houses are bungalows, built the 1920s. It was a largely working class neighborhood with several sections of light industry and retail.

It gradually shifted in the 1950s, '60s and '70s, becoming predominanUy African-American. Larimer suffered the same clus v..