From Our Executive Director

In 1996, when I moved my family to East Liberty to become the executive director of East Liberty Development, Inc. (ELDI), the neighborhood did not look like it does today. The East Liberty I came to was suffering from vacant buildings, blight, crime, and drugs. That was the condition of the commercial core, and sadly, the residential enclave was just as distressed. It turned out that ELDI as an organization was also in a state of distress, having lost the faith and trust of the neighborhood.

I moved from Cleveland where I had been successfully working in real estate since the 1970s and was the executive director of Hough Area Partners in Process, a community organization working in the inner-city of Cleveland. While I was skilled at completing bricks and mortar housing developments, I realized that before I could do development in East Liberty, I would have to build back and earn the trust of the neighborhood

My first task was gathering the community to listen, learn, and develop a vision for their dreams and desires for this struggling neighborhood. Three years and literally hundreds of meetings led to the development of the 1999 East Liberty Community Plan. This bold plan called for a revitalized commercial core, hotels and restaurants—and most importantly—a mixed-income community. The mostly minority community that I was working with knew the path the neighborhood was on was unsustainable. That community plan, as well as the 2010 East Liberty Community Plan, have served as our road map and my job description for two decades. While the community plans set the roadmap for change, it was the opening of The Home Depot in 2000 that started to change the perception of East Liberty. Home Depot’s success encouraged other retailers and developers to once again view East Liberty as a regional market and helped jump start our vision of a vibrant commercial core. It’s amazing to walk down Penn Avenue two decades later and see the results. Neighbors of all colors and socioeconomic levels, a diverse collection of stores and restaurants, thousands of new jobs, new parks, a reconstructed transit center, bike lanes, and on and on.

But the achievement I’m most proud of is protecting and improving affordable housing during this amazing transformation. Most people are shocked to learn that over 30% of East Liberty’s rental units are permanently affordable, and they’re even more shocked when they see this beautiful housing at places like East Liberty Place South, Fairfield Apartments, Dad’s House, or Cornerstone Village Apartments, many of which you will read about in the following pages.

I’m also proud to have worked with so many amazing partners—from single moms at East Liberty Garden Apartments to fellow nonprofits to multi-million dollar developers—all working together to change our community for the better.

The mixed-income East Liberty of today is very much the vision that was born from the blight and struggles of our first community meeting in 1996. I hope as you read through the following pages you will have a fuller understanding of the amazing journey of East Liberty and its people over these past two decades. It’s been my honor and life’s passion to be part of this community work for the past 25 years. Enjoy!

Sincerely,

MAELENE J. MYERS