After several months of discussing the city’s blight crisis, a group of grassroots advocates, corporate leaders, elected officials and land use experts have unveiled a 23-page document to set the tone moving forward.
There are 13,000 structures and vacant lots in Memphis that qualify as blighted, according to an estimate by local anti-blight advocacy group Neighborhood Preservation Inc. Among them are thousands abandoned houses that become havens for criminals as well as multistory apartment buildings where children sometimes play.
Memphis has more than 40,000 abandoned properties. Some call it blight, while others call it a missed opportunity.
According to a recent analysis by Innovate Memphis, the residential area around Lincoln Elementary School in South Memphis (near the intersection of South Parkway and Lauderdale Street) is approximately three-quarters blighted. No one should live like this — certainly not in Memphis, known as one of the nation’s most generous cities. Sadly, many of our citizens do, including thousands of our children.