New homes coming to west Rockford subdivision that was left incomplete years ago

By Kevin Haas
Rock River Current
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ROCKFORD — A subdivision on the city’s west end that was left incomplete after the housing bubble burst in 2008 will be resuscitated over the next three years as new single-family homes are built on long-vacant lots.

Rockford Area Habitat for Humanity will purchase more than 25 lots from the Region 1 Land Bank in the Emerson Estates Subdivision off North Springfield Avenue near Auburn High School, Kennedy Middle School and McIntosh Elementary School.

Rockford Public Schools and Habitat will work together to find teachers who qualify for Habitat assistance to purchase the homes, many of which will be built with the help of high school trades classes.

“This has really been an amazing collaboration between several different government agencies as well as a nonprofit,” Mayor Tom McNamara said at a news conference Monday at one of the lots on Chisholm Trail. “To see us all working together, I think this shows that we have a lot of possibilities when we’re all coming together.”

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The lots were all acquired by the R1 Land Bank after they sat in tax-delinquent status. They’ll be sold to Habitat for about $1,000 each, or the cost of attorney’s fees. There’s no cost to the taxpayer.

“It will create more rich and vibrant neighborhood,” said Mike Dunn Jr., executive director of the Region 1 Planning Council. “Hopefully you’ll see private investment follow suit and establish around the fringe.”

Land banks are a tool designed to give local governments a better opportunity to put abandoned or tax-delinquent properties back into the hands of responsible owners. In doing so, it puts the property back on the tax rolls to the benefit of all taxpayers, Dunn said.

This development, state Sen. Steve Stadelman said, also helps address affordable housing issues, it will help Rockford Public Schools recruit teachers and other staff, it improves an unfinished neighborhood and adds economic development to a side of town that needs it.

“It touches so many different challenges we face,” said Stadelman, a Democrat from Loves Park. “This is a really wonderful project. I can’t wait to see what this looks like a couple of years down the road.”

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Habitat will also take advantage of neighborhood infrastructure the city built before the housing market collapsed at the onset of the Great Recession. The city took on $1.3 million in debt in 2002 to built 27 single-family homes, a Family Dollar and a gas station and Subway restaurant at the site, according to the Register Star. Then, it borrowed $1.8 million in 2005 for a second phase of the project. More than 4o homes were supposed to be built, but only six were finished.

The new homes will be equipped with electric vehicle chargers and built with energy efficiency in mind, said Keri Asevedo, executive director of the Rockford Habitat.

She said Habitat is applying for a grant from the Department of Energy that would allow the nonprofit to build an all-electric subdivision.

“We will put geothermal wells right here where we stand and make these homes the most energy-efficient new construction homes in Rockford,” Asevedo said.

This article is by Kevin Haas. Email him at khaas@rockrivercurrent.com or follow him on Twitter at @KevinMHaas.