Cedar Rapids council gives the green light on home demolitions next to Czech Village

The demolition will begin on about 60 homes next to Czech Village that have been deemed an “imminent threat” to the public health and safety, the City Council decided in the fourth hour of last night's meeting.

After the meeting, Mayor Ron Corbett said no formal council vote was taken or needed to let the city proceed with demolitions, though he said comments from seven of nine council members supported beginning demolitions in the neighborhood.

The mayor said council members Pat Shey and Tom Podzimek spoke in favor of allowing an Iowa City developer and a Cedar Rapids planning consultant a 30-day period to try to get the residential area next to Czech Village declared a historic one. State and federal officials only recently concluded that the area was not historic, acknowledged planning consultant Richard Luther.

Nonetheless, Luther said he and developer Charles Jones had a plan to tear off siding and remove porches and additions in order to try to make a case for their historic status. Thirteen of about 100 homes in the neighborhood already are possibly eligible for historic status, he said.

Corbett said council member Justin Shields made the case last night that this group of homes were hit hardest by the flood and that some of them have not been cleaned out, 28 months after the flood. Many of the homes were “challenged” before the flood, Corbett said Shields noted.

“Our heart goes out to what we lost from the flood,” the mayor said. “The fact is that it was a devastating flood, and not everything is going to be the same. And we're going into a third winter with these vacant homes.”

Corbett noted that another 40 homes next to Czech Village, all of which are in the 100-year flood plain and about half of which are in the construction zone for the city's new flood-protection system, are not on the city's immediate demolition list. Some of those can be moved, but he noted that no developer has expressed an interest in doing so even as the city has offered to give the homes away.

Corbett envisioned new homes going up in part of the neighborhood next to the Czech Village commercial district once the city's new flood-protection system is in place.