BALTIMORE — A Boston group is contributing toward a local effort to buy and rehab properties along York Road in northern Baltimore City.
Boston's Local Enterprise Assistance Fund is helping with a $100,000 loan to the nonprofit Invest York Road, which has been seeking to buy and restore two or three commercial buildings between 42nd Street and Northern Parkway.
It's the "first community ownership program in Baltimore" for the Boston group, announced Baltimore Community Foundation.
It's also the latest burst of investment in the city's stretch of York Road, which has a number of blighted and vacant properties, and has long suffered from an economic downturn and crime, including shootings.
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Baltimore Community Foundation wrote in a recent blog post:
Invest York Road’s strategy, the first of its kind in Maryland, is to purchase blighted properties by pooling the smaller investments of community members to renovate the properties and then renting them to businesses that add to the vibrancy of the neighborhoods. Community members buy equity stakes in the businesses, which are paid back through rent. Invest York Road is currently led by community members, with a board to be elected soon by equity holders in the community. The organization will retain an ownership stake, hire a property manager, and serve as the corporate conduit for the equity owners.
Invest York Road was created in 2019.
