Interns find they can make a difference at non-profit CDCs

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, May 19, 2008

By Diana Nelson Jones

Academia's interest in nonprofit management and a return of investment to city neighborhoods have made Pittsburgh's organizations attractive training grounds, and grantors are investing in projects in which the students participate.

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City has new map to guide housing investment

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, April 29, 2008

By Rich Lord

Pittsburgh officials and community development groups today revealed the findings of a five-month study of the city's residential market that will be used to guide investment in housing.

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Redefining Pittsburgh's neighborhood districts

Pittsburgh Business Times, April 18, 2008

By Tim Schooley

There's more to Pittsburgh neighborhoods than meets the eye. This article highlights just a few of Pittsburgh's unique community business districts and the transformations that they are undergoing, from new developments to county-wide changes in the way these communities are funded.

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Groundbreaking today for Bloomfield townhouses

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, April 16, 2008

By Diana Nelson Jones

Friendship Development Associates will break ground today on three townhouses to fill a corner lot that the nonprofit has owned and tried to develop for nine years.

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Lawrenceville United  & City of Pittsburgh Police Department Receive MetLife Foundation Community-Police Partnership Award

The MetLife Foundation supports educational, health, civic and cultural organizations with the goal of strengthening communities. Lawrenceville United, a 2008 PPND capacity grantee, has been awarded the 2007 MetLife Foundation Community-Police Partnership Award for Neighborhood Revitalization. 

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Market Square project gets boost

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, March 14, 2008

By Steve Levin

The city's Urban Redevelopment Authority yesterday approved a $5 million bridge loan to the developers of Market Square Place to enable them to begin construction by the end of May on the $32 million project.

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Pittsburgh offers home foreclosure help

Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, March 11, 2008

By Sam Spatter and Ron DaParma

Homeowners in seven Pittsburgh neighborhoods have the highest mortgage foreclosure rates in the city, ranging as high as one for each 140 households, figures released Monday show.

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10 new single-family homes coming to Homewood

Pop City , February 6, 2008

By Jennifer Baron

Ten new single-family homes will soon be under construction along the 7500 block of Susquehanna Street, adjacent to Helen Faison Arts Academy in Homewood.  The 30-unit residential project will also bring new homes to Braddock Avenue, Finance Street and North Homewood Avenue.  Construction is expected to start in March.

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The stories below are just a sample of community development activities in Pittsburgh in 2007. (Thanks to Katherine Camp, Coro Fellow in Public Affairs, for this compilation.)

Weed and Seed Partners Win National Awards

Weed & Seed In-Sites, Fall 2007

By Julia Ryan

Three Weed and Seed sites recently received national recognition by winning the 2007 MetLife Foundation Community-Police Partnership Awards, which come with grants of $10,000 to $25,000. The Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) and MetLife Foundation announced the 11 winners of this award in July.

The community organization Lawrenceville United (LU) and the Pittsburgh Police Department were recognized in the Neighborhood Revitalization category for significant achievements in reducing crime and engaging community members in a comprehensive effort to strengthen the economic and social fabric of the Lawrenceville neighborhood.

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Students helping communities through various programs

Point Park News Service, Fall 2007

By Nicole Henninger 

As he sifted through an alleyway that had become a dumping ground for garbage, University of Pittsburgh student Nathan Blatt found a sleeping ground for the homeless, covered by trees, weeds and layers upon layers of broken alcohol bottles, plastic cups and soggy cardboard.

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New townhouses, residential property rehabs planned for historic Deutschtown

Pop City, November 21, 2007

By Jennifer Baron 

Plans to build new townhouses and rehabilitate properties in Pittsburgh 's historic Deutschtown neighborhood are now underway. October Development is working with the North Side Leadership Conference (NSLC) and the URA to build three new townhouses and rehabilitate two single-family homes on James and Suisman Streets.

City to study neighborhood development investment

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, October 31, 2007

Work set to start on $6.4M mixed-use Glass Lofts in Friendship

Pop City, October 24, 2007

By Jennifer Baron

A new green condo project will soon be underway in the heart of the Penn Avenue Arts District. Friendship Development Associates (FDA) has just secured construction financing for The Glass Lofts, which will feature 18 for-sale lofts, a 3,200-square-foot restaurant, artist studios, and 1,200 square feet of office space.

East Liberty housing's good design is rewarded with funding

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, October 22, 2007

By Diana Nelson Jones

Design advocates have been trying for years to convince people that good design is not a luxury. Recently, they succeeded in convincing the hardest of all sells: financiers and developers.

A Design District Takes Shape

New York Times, October 14, 2007

By Jeff Schlegel

Butler Street is a place the chain stores forgot, and until fairly recently, so had most of Pittsburgh. As the main drag through the blue-collar Lawrenceville neighborhood, which lost jobs and people after the city's steel mills closed roughly a quarter-century ago, Butler Street wallowed in seedy obscurity even as Pittsburgh shook off its sooty past and emerged as a health care and scientific research center. But in the past five years artists and other creative types have bought into the area's dirt-cheap storefronts and turn-of-the-last-century brick row houses, and opened galleries, boutiques and interior design shops along Butler Street . Today, it's a hub for an arts, fashion and interior design district called the 16:62 Design Zone that begins at the 16th Street Bridge in the adjacent Strip District and extends to the 62nd Street Bridge in Lawrenceville.

Greening the Neighborhoods

Pop City, August 16, 2007

By Jennifer McGuiggan

Perhaps you long for a greener, more cosmopolitan lifestyle; say, a diverse urban setting where you can shop, play, eat and even work within short distances of your home. Fewer trips in the car. An energy efficient home. A community that values sound environmental practices. In a movement called “Green Urbanism”, greening whole neighborhoods is catching on in cities such as Portland and Denver —and now, Pittsburgh. A LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) pilot project is about to certify master-planned neighborhoods that define sustainable living and two projects in Pittsburgh have qualified for it.

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Children offer their input on South Side neighborhood plan

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, May 25, 2007

By Diana Nelson Jones

In Stephanie Moran's perfect park, a child would never get bored. Tired maybe, but never bored. She was one of more than 60 fourth- and fifth-graders at Phillips Elementary whose input the South Side Planning Forum will incorporate into the latest revision of its neighborhood plan.

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Dumpster Project hits Oakland curbs April 3

Tribune-Review, February 22, 2007

By Richard Byrne Reilly

University of Pittsburgh senior David Carmassi says it's not surprising college students dumped 75 tons of furniture and trash onto the streets of Oakland last year. "If you ask me, students don't care because once they move out, they're not coming back. When they do move, they leave stuff behind, and when the new people move in, they just take the stuff and toss it out into the streets," said Carmassi, 23. The Dumpster Project aims to lessen the public eyesore created by tons of desks, tables, couches, futons and computers that Pitt, Carnegie Mellon University and Carlow University students discard at the end of the school year and again in August when school starts.

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Below are links to web pages with more local community development news:

Profiles of Pittsburgh Neighborhoods by Pop City

News pertaining to nonprofits in the Pittsburgh region on GreatNonprofits.org

News from Lawrenceville, collected by the Lawrenceville Corporation

News about the 16:62 Design Zone

News about programs at Oakland Planning and Development Corporation

East Liberty Post, a blog produced by East Liberty Development, Inc.