(MOBILE, Ala.) The City of Mobile unveiled its plan Wednesday morning to revitalize hundreds of dilapidated and blighted properties throughout the city.
The Mobile Neighborhood Renewal Program was recommended two years ago in the New Plan for Mobile. An expedited title act passed last year puts vacant and tax delinquent properties back to the tax roll, without red tape from state entities.
"It's a program where we can take blighted properties, abandoned properties, properties that have tax liens on them and really make them active development parcels," Mayor Sam Jones said.
Jones said, though the Neighborhood Renewal Program will be administered citywide, there are 129 parcels available for development now.
Jones said the city taking over the properties will make it easier and more attractive for potential developers to start building.
"There's so many liens on these properties, you can't get clear title to them," Jones said, "and so nobody's going to invest their money where they can't get title insurance, where they can't get clear title and where they can't acquire the property in a timely manner."
The initial project includes the Oakdale, Maysville, Texas Hills, the Campground, the Bottom and Trinity Gardens neighborhoods, and will cover the entire city.
Mayor Sam Jones said the project will correct an array of problems plaguing the target neighborhoods.
"Whether it has crime in it, whether it has infrastructure problems, whether we have code problems in those communities," Jones said, "all of those folks will all work together to make sure their community is properly developed.
"A lot of cities are interested in this because all cities have the same problem."
Mayor Jones said prospective developers must come to them with a plan about how they're going to make things better, and complete the project within a reasonable amount of time.
