I stopped by and walked around this house today..met a workman who
said it was slated to be demolished "within a month". (Actually, the
rear of the place already seems to look a little torn apart.) He said
that even though the building is empty now, it's still in pretty good
shape inside. Said it was beautiful and that it was a shame to
demolish such a well-built structure.
Is it good news that he said they were only supposed to gut it and
leave the masonary structure intact?
A recent breezeway addition connects this main structure to another
little brick building in the rear, and that looks like it connects to
one of the apartment houses on Chester?
-cm
`·.¸¸.·´¯`·.¸.·´¯`·...¸><((((º>
On Feb 11, 2009, at 1:56 PM, mcget...@aol.com wrote:
When I read that the demolition permit had a June, 2008 date
crossed out and handwritten in was a January, 2009 date, and, in
addition, that the original L&I supervisor's name (Gallagher from
the Western District) had also been crossed out and replaced with
the name Perry Cocco, who works out of the 11th and Wharton office
of L&I, I smelled a rat and decided to do a little googling. I
think that the neighborhood now has good reason to fear what will
be proposed for that site when the historically-contributing
building there is demolished. Just a few facts to ponder:
-The site was bought by Thylen Associates, a New York-based
developer in Jan., 2008 for $3,500,000.
Can you imagine what kind of a project they need to assure them of
a decent return on an investment of this magnitude?
-Thylan, Campenella and a man named Sean D. McDougall jointly
developed a site at 13th and Race called the Lithograph Lofts, the
renovation of an old factory structure into residences.
-Sean McDougall is the owner of a company called Minsec
Corrections Corp., based in Wallingford. Their business is in what
they call "Community Corrections Facilities", which are essentially
privately-run jails located in , guess what?, "communities"! They
also run drug re-hab facilities. Their web site (www.minsec.com)
explains how their expertise lies in locating and purchasing sites
and building these correctional facilities in co-operation with
local government. (Are we starting to have any flashbacks yet to
the deal Campenella worked out with Jannie Blackwell over the
proposed shelter at 45th and Chestnut St., a deal that was
astonishing in its attempt to circumvent city laws, but only
defeated because of local opposition.) The Minsec website also
touts Mr. McDougall as the head of a multi-million dollar real
estate enterprise.
-Campenella has a drug distribution conviction from 1993 ( a
youthful indiscretion no doubt - he was only in his forties at the
time) and most recently (2007) was charged with paying a $20,000
bribe to a city tax assessor to lower the assessments on 4
different properties he owns by millions of dollars. The news
accounts suggest that he pled guilty to the charges but I haven't
been able to confirm that. He appears to be a free man, so I guess
he didn't get the full 5 years that was the maximum for this crime
of corrupting a public official.
It seems pretty clear to me that the current owners of 4224
Baltimore had requested a permit to demolish last year with the
expectation that the hotel project was close to a done deal, that
the precedent for large non-residential projects had been
established and that their project would thus be likely to win
approval. Of course, the tough fight against the hotel upset their
timetable and they had to get a new permit, one starting in January
this year. I think one would have to be awfully naive not to
suspect that the fix is probably in on the hotel project and that
these guys have gotten the word. They are now set to proceed on
whatever they have planned for two nineteenth-century structures
and one of the last plots of open land in our community.
Mary
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