FEDERAL GRANTS

New facilities for Knox College will replace two residential slums in Galesburg, Illinois, which received approval of Federal loans totalling $210,562 and capital grants totalling $146,921 for its urban renewal project areas "A" and "B," it was announced today by Urban Renewal Commissioner Richard L. Steiner.

The loan for area A is $140,681; the capital grant—$98,541. For area B : Loan—$69,881; capital grant—$48,380.

The two areas, totalling almost 10 acres, flank the college campus, located about one-half mile from Galesburg's central business district. They contain 43 dwelling units, most of which are substandard. The 38 families now living there will be offered relocation in decent, safe and sanitary quarters, as required by law.

The Knox County Housing Authority will sell the land, after clearance, to the college for campus expansion purposes. A new stadium will be built in one area and an athletic field in another.

Estimated net cost of the two projects is $212,928. This represents the difference between the cost of acquiring, clearing, and preparing the land for its new uses and the return from its resale at fair value. The $146,921 combined Federal grants cover two-thirds of this deficit. The remaining one-third of the loss will be covered by local contributions.

The Tri-County Regional Planning Commission, Peoria, Illinois, will use a $6,500 Federal grant approved by Urban Renewal Commissioner Richard L. Steiner to analyze existing zoning and subdivision regulations for the metropolitan area consisting of the urbanized portions of Peoria, Tazewell, and Woodford Counties.

The area, covering about 350 square miles, had a 1950 population of more than 270,000. The studies to be aided by the Federal grant represent the first step in a long-range planning program designed to guide the growth of the area.

The Federal grant, with a matching amount of private and local public funds, will be used for the studies, which will be completed in six months. A number of public and private organizations are contributing funds for both the zoning and subdivision analyses and the major portion of the long-range planning to be undertaken following completion of the current work.

The grant was approved under the urban planning assistance program authorized by the Housing Act of 1954 to provide Federal funds to official State, metropolitan, and regional planning agencies for work in metropolitan and regional areas. Similar grants are available to State planning agencies to aid them in giving planning assistance to communities of less than 25,000 population. The grants may not exceed 50 percent of the cost of the work for which they are made. State and local funds make up the remainder.

Rock Island, Illinois, an industrial city of 48,710 persons (1950), and a part of the tri-city complex which consists also of Moline, Illinois, and Davenport, Iowa, on the Mississippi River, received from Housing Administrator Albert M. Cole approval of its workable program for the elimination of slums and blight.

The City has applied to the Urban Renewal Administration for an advance to prepare a general neighborhood renewal plan. Further studies are underway on the scope and means for carrying out renewal measures in the remainder of the City.

The Rock Island Housing Authority has 452 units of public housing under management, plus 136 units of temporary housing. The Planning Department, however, has recommended that the temporary units be demolished and that the Housing Authority proceed with the planning of 50 new units. The City contemplates making application for Section 221 FHA mortgage insurance assistance in the relocation of displaced families. Persons so far displaced by street widening and reloca-

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tion and off-street parking facilities have found homes in the existing housing market.

Rock Island has a quota of codes and ordinances which apply to new construction but not to existing buildings unless extensive alterations are made in them. City officials are now at work on a minimum housing code which will apply to all buildings. The City also had building, plumbing and health codes which will be restudied. An electrical code conforming to modern approved standards was adopted in July, 1967.

Rock Island established its Planning Commission in 1941, and a Department of Planning was set up in 1954 with a professional staff and the services of a consultant. Sections of the comprehensive community plan including land use, thoroughfare and community facilities plans, and revised subdivision regulations, were adopted last December. Revisions of the zoning ordinance are under study and a public improvements program is set for completion by September.

In implementation of the neighborhood analyses element of the workable program, the Planning Department has partially completed its basic studies. These include statistics and estimates on the total community blight problems and on occupancy characteristics, and indicate the location of substandard areas and causes of blight. Areas for urban renewal action have been delineated with preliminary recommendations for remedial actions.

City authorities are aware of the importance of citizens' interest and participation in the program and a civic organization is to be developed with the assistance of the Rock Island Board of Realtors. The local newspapers also have stimulated interest by thorough coverage of the steps already taken in line with the urban renewal activities.

More than 17 acres of slums in Chicago's South Side "6-D" urban renewal project will be eliminated with the aid of a $1,948,430 Federal loan and a $1,687,420 capital grant approved by Urban Renewal Commissioner Richard L. Steiner.

The predominantly residential area, about three and one-half miles south of the Loop, is one of four projects involved in Redevelopment Area No. 6, It is bounded by 29th Street, Prairie Avenue, 30th Street, and Michigan Avenue. It contains 681 dwelling units, most of which are substandard. The 548 families now living in the area will be offered relocation in decent, safe, and sanitary quarters, as required by law.

Chicago's redevelopment plan tor the area calls for predominantly residential new uses. The city has yet to determine whether high-rise apartments or single-family houses will he built. Also included in redevelopment will be a shopping center and a park designed to serve Dunbar High School.

Estimated net cost of the project is $2,451,667. This represents the difference between the cost of acquiring, clearing, and preparing the land for its new uses and the return from its resale at fair value. The $1,687,420 Federal capital grant covers two-thirds of this deficit and includes an amount for aiding in the relocation of site residents. Chicago's contribution will cover the remaining one-third of the loss.

A loan of $40,000 to the village of LaFayette, Stark County, Illinois, for the construction of a waterworks system, was approved by Commissioner John C. Hazeltine of the Community Facilities Administration. The loan is contingent on the inability of the applicant to obtain private financing on reasonable terms.

LaFayette is a community of about 300 persons 35 miles northwest of Peoria. At present it has no public water system. In 1936 more than three out of four private wells went dry. The project will include a deep well, pump, pressure storage tank, fire hydrants, water mains and service connections.

Commissioner John C. Hazeltine announced the approval of a Community Facilities Administration loan of $135,000 to the village of Alhambra, Madison County, Illinois, for the construction of water and sanitary sewer facilities.

The project will cost an estimated $199,000, of which $64,000 will be of the applicant's funds, and will consist of a deep well turbine pump, distribution lines, storage tank and fire hydrants, and sewer collection lines. A deep well has been completed and a trunk sewer and a treatment plant will be built by the Alhambra Sanitary District.

Alhambra is a community of about 500 persons 25 miles northeast of St. Louis, Mo. At present it has no water or sewer system. The water from private wells is insufficient and at times is contaminated by septic tanks.

This loan is contingent on the inability of the applicant to obtain private financing at reasonable rates.

East St. Louis, Illinois, on the Mississippi River opposite St. Louis, Missouri, received from Housing Administrator Albert M. Cole recertification until July 1, 1959, of its workable program for the elimination of slums and blight.

With this recertification, this manufacturing city of 82,295 persons (1950) continues to be eligible for Federal assistance in carrying out its urban renewal program. East St. Louis has one urban renewal project, the 10th and Broadway area, in planning stage and delineation of a second renewal project is under consideration.

Southern Illinois University, located at Carbondale, has set up an office in East St. Louis under the name of Community Progress, Inc., and has

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FEDERAL GRANTS

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assigned students to prepare economic base and population characteristic studies. A draft of the first report is now being used by the planners. Other studies will provide action programs at citizen committee levels.

East St. Louis has a complement of codes and ordinances regarded as adequate if vigorously enforced to control blight. The City reports that a beginning has been made on enforcement of the minimum housing code in selected areas.

Considerable preliminary work has been done in developing the city's comprehensive community plan and preliminary reports are under review with adoption of land use, thoroughfare and community facilities plans, a public improvements program, a revised zoning ordinance and subdivision regulations set for this summer.

In implementing the neighborhood analyses element of the workable program, a statistical data map based on housing surveys by the Census Bureau has been prepared, but actual work of delineating residential neighborhoods and defining areas of substandard housing, with reports on factors causing blight and suggestions for corrective action, is not far advanced. Special citizen committees, guided by technical personnel, will make the requisite surveys and reports.

The local housing authority will assume responsibility for relocating in standard housing families displaced by urban renewal or other governmental actions. More than 100 families already have been assisted in relocating from the site being cleared for the construction of 500 low-rent units allocated by the Public Housing Administration. With the completion of this development East St. Louis will have 1,108 units of low-rent public housing under management.

The Housing Authority also plans a program of building sales housing with Section 221 FHA mortgage insurance assistance and 97 units have been certified by the Housing Committee. These low-cost sale dwellings may be built on title clouded or tax-forfeited lots within the city.

Page 171 / Illinois Municipal Review / July 1958