A new house bill is allowing Carroll County Commissioners to demolish a few eye sores in the area.
The Ohio Building Demolition and Site Revitalization Program recently was created through House Bill 110. Commissioner Chris Modranski said the county plans to knock down four buildings – including the former Hornet’s Nest at 633 Wilson St. – which was purchased for $24,000 by Rick Lewis five years ago.
“The state of Ohio has created an opportunity for us to clean up some eyesores and structurally damaged dwellings and we are going to take advantage of that because it will make Carroll County a more pleasant and safer community to live,” said Modranski. “If the State of Ohio is going to use your hard earned tax money on programs like these I am going to make sure that money is spent in Carroll County and not somewhere else in Ohio.”
The purpose of the new program is to is to award grants for the demolition of commercial and residential buildings and revitalization of surrounding properties on sites that are not brown fields, according to Modranski.
This program provides $150 million with $500,000 set-aside per county. The remaining funds will be provided on a “first-come, first-served” basis.
Commercial properties include buildings that were used for retail, office, manufacturing, industrial, industrial warehousing, institutional, or other non-residential or mixed-use (meaning any mix of these uses or a mix of residential and commercial uses) purposes.
To properly use the money that Carroll County received, applications were sent to different organizations in the community to complete and submit the location of the buildings they want torn down.
“We sent notice and an application for the program to each township, municipality, The Carroll County General Health District and the general public advising them of the program opportunity,” said Modranski. “We received 4 applications for vacant dwellings in which the property owner would like demolished.”
Modranski said the applications were submitted for approval. Once approval is received, the county will begin to obtain bids from excavators to demolish the buildings and provide site restoration (grading and seeding).
In addition to the Hornet’s Nest, the other properties to be demolished are located on the properties of Leesville Faith Community Chapel (55 S. Union St. in Leesville), 8036 Andora Road in Augusta Township and a house and garage located at 2257 Waynesburg Road in Harrison Township (owned by the township).