The Baltimore City Council recently announced that it will sell vacant properties for just $1 in an attempt to breathe life into worn-down neighborhoods across the city.
Baltimore is home to over 13,000 vacant properties, and at least 1,000 of those are owned by the city. The scheme favors locals — for city residents, $1 is the asking price; for small nonprofits, $1,000; and for large nonprofits and developers, $3,000.
City Council president Nick Mosby made sure to vote against the measure, stating that he feared improvements to the neighborhoods might . . . improve the neighborhoods. Can’t have that!
When I first read this news, I thought immediately of the great potential for a new 21st-century utopian experiment. (Is The Benedict Option passé now? Is anyone still talking about forming New Urbanist Catholic communes?)
With just a couple of bucks, a few steely Catholic families, and a whole lotta chutzpah, Baltimore, Md., could become Mary’s Land again. I believe Rod Dreher is still traipsing around Budapest, but this could be his vocation.
Just imagine: an entire block of century-old townhomes, cherubic children tumbling around on the quiet street, mothers chatting on the porch, gunshots and sirens in the background, fathers watching the game, church bells chiming the time, an iron curtain surrounding the perimeter . . . heaven on earth.
The “Buy into BMore” map shares some, er, uncanny overlap with the Baltimore Police Department Crime Map. The former pinpoints where vacant lots and houses are available for sale. The latter serves as a heat map of crimes committed across the city. (With over 40,000 violent crimes committed in the past year, it’s a bit crowded.)
It really would be beautiful to see city residents step up, pay the dollar, renovate these vacant houses, and revive some of Baltimore’s struggling neighborhoods. Given how much it costs to flip an abandoned house, however, I doubt this will be a tempting offer for most local residents (for whom the City Council has purportedly designed the policy). And, given the low safety ratings of most neighborhoods where the $1 homes are for sale, I doubt this will tempt families with the necessary capital to take on the project.
But hey, if anyone could do it, it would be a clan of Catholic mothers. They have my full and unwavering support.