Post 2008, the Trumbull County Land Bank acquired a vast inventory of historic homes in the City of Warren OH, offering to sell (or give) them away for small sums such as $5,000. There were catches, however - you had to have hundreds of thousands of dollars vested in your bank account, you had to promise to turn these immense houses into a single-family residences, and you had to promise to live in them.  There was also another strict rule - you could not make them into apartments & become a “slum lord.”

Now - before you sign this petition - let’s get into the historic reason why many of these historic homes lasted, the economic determinism behind it, and analyze whether governments should socialistically get involved in free-market laissez-faire real estate economics in the first place. 

With the advent of the automobile, people of means wanted to live further from the city.  Post 1929 (the Great Depression), many of these grand homes were in fact torn down.  However, most others were turned into apartment buildings, providing valuable housing to young adults just starting in life and lower income individuals in the process.  With the popularity of the 80s-2000’s TV show “This Old House” by Bob Vila, still more of these grand homes were  restored as law, doctor, and other types of offices. 

Fast forward to post- 2008 and the meltdown of the housing market….

The Land Bank wanted to deter these “slum lords”, and mandated that their vast inventory couldn’t be subdivided and used as apartments again - they must be single family residences. 

People with that kind of money vested in the bank did not want to live in these neighborhoods, and so - these houses sat, and deteriorated, and deteriorated some more.  And one by one, they were stripped of their fine casework by the Land Bank- and torn down. 

In short - these were impossible standards in neighborhoods like these.  Within a decade and a half, up to 40% of Warren’s core historic district low income housing and historic homes disappeared… and are still disappearing to this day.

 It’s been suggested that Warren Redevelopment & Planning (WRAP) and Mayor Franklin’s Administration have been in cahoots, becoming VERY stringent with their condemnation standards - forcing many private owner’s properties into the hands of Land Bank for them to demolish as they wished.  There have been rumors and alleged documented proof of awarding SPECIFIC demolition companies, these collusion rumors confirmed per the recent lawsuit brought forth by Moderelli Demolition against the Trumbull County Land Bank.

To have the power to forcefully seize property from owners, to use our tax dollars to tear these buildings down, to burden those same owners with liens for the full inflated and exorbitant costs of these demolitions, collusion in awarding  demolition contracts to specific companies, rumors of kick-backs, to deplete housing inventory in historically low income neighborhoods, tearing down historic buildings scores at a time, all on the taxpayer dime - all this is nothing short of a CRIME, undermining public good will - and must be investigated.

Please sign this petition to lobby our State & Federal Government to take a closer into the Trumbull County Land Bank, its dealings with WRAP, its relationship with the current administration of Mayor Franklin, its questionable seizure of Private Lands and subsequent imposition of liens upon property owners for high-priced demolitions, and it’s flagrant disregard of our nation’s regional historic infrastructure.