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1116 Cahaba Street in eastern Birmingham lot near a church and Patton Park. Property available in Birmingham, Alabama to be used in a land band.

(Frank Couch)

The Birmingham Business Alliance's Land Bank Authority Seminar held this morning discussed the city's blight strategy and previewed the abilities of the land bank. Elected officials, public employees and business owners were all in attendance.

Last year, the city created the land bank to serve as a quasi-public authority that can acquire and dispose of tax-delinquent properties. The City Council appointed four of the seven land bank board members last month, but Mayor William Bell has yet to make his three appointments. His decision and the first board meeting are expected this month.

The city's overarching blight strategy is called RISE Birmingham. RISE stands for: Remove blight, Increase values, Strengthen neighborhoods and Empower residents. The strategy will use the land bank and other tools to condemn, demolish, redevelop and sell troubled properties.

The speakers at the seminar included Phillip Amthor of the Department of Community Development, John Colon of the Department of Community Development, Charles Ball of the Regional Planning Commission of Greater Birmingham, Jim Stanley of the city's legal department and David Fleming of REV Birmingham.

The Issue at Hand

Statistics

The city has about 16,000 tax-delinquent properties.

6,500 of those properties have been tax delinquent for five or more years, meaning the land bank is authorized to acquire them.

The city has already demolished about 15,000 properties and used other means to remove another 3,500 units.

Costs

Implementing the RISE strategy citywide would cost an estimated $76.3 million.

It costs the city $1,000 annually to maintain delinquent properties for a $6.6 million total cost.

The city's public school system missed out on $1 million last year because of tax-delinquent properties.

The Approach

Tools

Blight removal will consist of strategic demolitions that may not be equitable across the city, but will be as impactful as possible to communities.

The RISE strategy will be implemented mainly in the

The 2009 International Property Maintenance Code

The city has tasked Legal Services of Alabama, a nonprofit, to offer free legal services for residents regarding wills and trusts. Many properties are tax delinquent just because of poor paperwork.

What questions do you have about the land bank or blight removal in general? I'll try to answer them in the comments or I may follow up in another post.