Canton plan to encourage home improvements

From Canton City Council last night:

City Council hopes to encourage $2 million in investments by Canton homeowners. It would do so by spending $200,000 in city income tax revenue to reimburse homeowners for 10 percent of exterior home improvements they would make. Maximum reimbursement would be $1,000, which would reward a home project costing at least $10,000. A project would have to cost at least $5,000 to qualify.

The money Canton would spend to encourage homeowners would come from the half-percent city income tax increase approved by voters in May, specifically the neighborhood investment fund set up because of the tax increase. City Council is likely to approve this spending at its next meeting on Oct. 1.

The Community Building Partnership of Stark County would administer the program and make the grants. This program would operate like the Healthy Neighborhoods Program that the partnership has been operating since 2011. It has made 75 grants to homeowners in three targeted areas totaling $80,000, which represents at least $800,000 in homeowner investments.

Anywhere in the city

The targeted areas in the Healthy Neighborhoods Program have been Vassar Park, the Fulton Road corridor and the Aultman Hospital area, according to the agency’s website. The new program and its $200,000 in city tax funding could be used anywhere in the city.

Loan assistance

Community Building Partnership Executive Director Maureen Austin said her agency also can help city residents to acquire home improvement loans from local banks to pay their 90 percent share of eligible projects, and it can offer city residents credit counseling so they could qualify for such loans.

Ward 7 Councilman John Mariol said the funding would be divided in half, with $100,000 to help homeowners bring their homes up to compliance with the city building code. The other $100,000 could be used for any physical improvement.

One view: Not enough

Ward 6 Councilman Kevin Hall said in discussion Monday night that he didn’t think a 10 percent reimbursement was enough incentive to help people with larger code issues. “We need to go deeper to help,” he said.

The neighborhood investment fund created by the income tax increase was budgeted to have $500,000 in the first half-year of tax collections. Of that sum, City Council spent $250,000 on additional street paving. With this $200,000 expenditure, council would have $50,000 left in 2018 to spend on neighborhood improvements. Another $1 million-plus could be anticipated in 2019.