Thanks for the post Steve. I thought it was very interesting, and I
think this is an example of a lot of things going right. Great skill,
successful design idea that provides an alternative to traditional
building paradigms that have many negative repercussions, and its done
through personal relationship. I like it.
Now, get a load of this. Eh hem. I went to the Homeless Congress
meeting yesterday at the Bishop Cosgrove Center, and one of the points
on the agenda was a project they're developing to acquire vacant
buildings in Cleveland so that skilled residents of local shelters
could improve them and then move into a new home of their own. As we
all know, there are more than a couple vacant houses in our fair city,
many of which are owned by banks eager to release the dead weight. If
the property could be released to the City, then given to screened,
skilled laborers whom are partnered with local building experts/
consultants and possibly young architects that give a damn?! maybe we
can move towards relieving the sting of a few problems at once.
Councilman Matt Zone was in attendance and mentioned that the City
doesn't have some magic list of all these City owned houses, and most
houses that seem vacant are stuck in a complicated legal rats nest,
but it might be possible to find a few houses that would fit the
criteria the organization is proposing.
So, I shared with the group that I'm a member of the Cleveland Chapter
of Architecture for Humanity, and many people seemed excited that I
was there right then. I'm pretty sure one of the women let out a,
"Thank you JESus!" Brian Davis asked if we'd be able to make it to
the next month's meeting, which is May 8th at 1pm. Maybe we can talk
about their project, and see if we can help in some way. Maybe we
gather a group of younger architects that would be interested in
helping some of these guys design a home of their dreams. Could we
help coordinate the use of recycled materials from other homes/
material yards in the area? Is this an answer to the question, "What
are we actually going to document us DOING for the video project?"
I also found our that there will be a meeting April 28th at the Mental
Health Services building @ 5pm, where NEOCH will meet with the various
groups that bring food downtown. The groups will be told that
effective April 28th they are no longer allowed to feed people
outdoors and will have to setup indoors at either The Spot or the
Women's Center. Brian Davis said that he expects the groups to resist
this action. So, this meeting might be something for us to consider
attending, and possibly documenting.
What do you think?
david
On Mar 25, 1:33 am, stephen <stephenpisc...@yahoo.com> wrote:
