With the land cleared, “people can visualize the potential of the site ,” Klein said.
Since 1929, a distinctive Spanish Colonial Revival-style building had stood on that corner.
The Ecki Building, on Preservation Dayton’s “endangered list,” had been vacant since a fire raged through it in October 2000.
The city demolished the structure Tuesday.
Dan Barton, communications manager for Preservation Dayton, considers the demolition a lost opportunity.
“We’ve got another empty hole,” Barton said. “The fact that the city pulled it so quietly and quickly means they wanted to do it without a fuss.”
The demolition of the 80-year-old Ecki Building marked the end of a nearly decade-long saga that pitted preservationists against developers.
The block-long commercial building with its terra cotta roof, vacant since an October 2000 fire ravaged it, cost the city of Dayton an estimated $95,000 to tear down. The Dayton Landmark Commission and the state approved the demolition.
An adjacent Laundromat on Wyoming Street and a cottage on Lathrop Avenue also have been demolished in the past two weeks, and the parcels are being combined with the Ecki property into one package. The city purchased the properties in 2009 for about $818,000.
City officials once envisioned the southeast corner of Wayne Avenue and Wyoming Street as the next big urban renewal project in town, with a major grocery store anchoring a three-block commercial district.
In 2002, Cincinnati-based Midland Atlantic Development, a partner with Kroger, made contact directly with residents of the area, dangling lucrative options to buy their properties. No deals were closed, and those contracts expired.
In September 2005, a city study designated the area behind the building as blighted with a substantial number of slums; unsafe and unsanitary conditions because of trash, litter and debris; and poor street layout for new development.
The city stepped in and negotiated options-to-buy the properties twice. In the second go-round, property owners who re-signed got a check for 3 percent of the already negotiated selling price. The total cost for the incentives was $117,000, paid to 48 property owners. Those options also expired.
Dayton’s hard-fought effort to clear a path for a $16 million Kroger on that corner ended in 2009 when the Cincinnati-based grocery chain backed away from the project for financial reasons.
Klein said the city tried to attract other developers to the site, but a request for development proposals attracted no takers. The city has no immediate plans to buy additional properties in the area.
“We still think that building a new Kroger on the site was the right thing to do. We still think there is strong demand for a grocery store there, though we do appreciate updates Kroger made to the Wayne Avenue store,” Klein said.
Dan Barton, communications manager for Preservation Dayton, called the city’s approach to redeveloping the corner “a case study in what not to do.”
Throughout its history, the Ecki Building had housed a variety of small businesses, according to Preservation Dayton. Its first occupants in 1930 were a beauty parlor, dry cleaner, furniture store, Kroger grocery, dentist and a drugstore. The second floor was home to the Knights of St. John, a Catholic charitable organization. The second floor later hosted Camilla Schad, elocutionist, and the Julian Dancing Academy, before being rented as individual apartments.
Leslie Sheward, Twin Towers Neighborhood Association president, said residents who live behind the Ecki Building have been frustrated by the uncertainty over the years. Many saw no reason to invest in the upkeep of their properties because they expected their homes to be sold and razed.
“The whole area has gotten more blighted than the rest of the neighborhood, because of the disinvestment,” Sheward said.
Twin Towers residents who want to make home repairs may be eligible for a $2,500, zero-interest loan through the East End Community Services’ Fix It Up Program. Call (937) 259-1898 for details.
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