Germantown without the “G-Word”: Can Community-Centric Development help sidestep Gentrification?

Sites like Grumblethorpe in Germantown are historic landmarks and should in theory bring tourism and growth, but the neighborhood has not seen much outside support. That’s leading some residents to take development into their own hands.

written by Cameron Morris & Katherine Bourque for the Germantown Infohub.

On a cool October morning, Cornelia Swinson — director of Johnson House Historic Site and member of Historic Germantown and the Germantown Special Services District boards, related the challenge of trying to encourage people to visit the neighborhood and its many historic sites.

“Two weeks ago, I was working at my office and the doorbell rang, and the woman that works in my office came upstairs and said: today’s not a tour day but there are people down here who have come from England and they specifically wanted to come up here and visit,” Swinson tells us as we walk down Germantown Avenue, the primary business corridor that connects Northwest and North Philadelphia to Broad Street and the central metropolitan area. “And we were told when we asked them, they were asked [by visitor center staff] ‘well, why do you want to go up there? It’s not safe’.”

The northwestern Philadelphia neighborhood’s unique socioeconomic structure (around 70% of residents are employed in “white-collar” jobs), burgeoning black middle-class and community organizations has made it a sort of model for what community-based economic development could look like — an alternative outside of the traditional contexts of displacement and demographic shifts that come with gentrification.

As much as the word generates visceral reactions in those that hear it, gentrification is not a new topic on the streets of Northwest Philadelphia or in the city at large.

The “g-word” — gentrification — hasn’t taken hold in Germantown the way it has elsewhere in Philly, but development is starting to kick off here as well. Although the median income in the neighborhood is still only around $28,000, the Philadelphia Department of Commerce is finalizing plans for a $3.3 million “remake” of Maplewood Mall along the Germantown Avenue business corridor, intended to revitalize the open-air plaza as a new haven for storefronts and pedestrian traffic.

Rendering of the proposed Maplewood Mall remodeling as provided by the City of Philadelphia credit: WHYY

Some may point to early high-capital investments like the Maplewood Mall remake as the beginning tremors of an earthquake from outside interests just like in other parts of Philadelphia — a boom that often sees residents and institutions left behind or pushed up with growth. Yet in this North Philly neighborhood, a few community groups embedded with the community that they might just have the answer to the dilemma.

For organizations like Germantown Special Services District, where Swinson is a board member, making sure that Maplewood Mall is renovated is only the beginning of a sustainable and responsible approach to bringing more to Germantown. In an email to us regarding the role of the GSSD, Swinson laid out her view of the matter. “I believe in the concept of equitable community development and will strive to ensure that continued investment in our growth is racially and economically inclusive.”

The balance of ensuring racially and economically inclusive growth, however, often boils down to a question of who will be around to see the growth.

Gaffney Fabrics has been a mainstay of the Germantown Ave corridor for decades, but many other commercial developments have left the area. Organizations like the GSSD are trying to bring new investment and businesses into the neighborhood.

New development in growing areas often goes hand in hand with the displacement of people already there. In University City, census tracts covering two parts of the area noted a loss of some 1000 affordable housing units from 2000 to 2014 as Penn and Drexel leaders were perceived as trying to transform parts of West Philadelphia “into Cambridge”, per residents quoted in the Philadelphia Inquirer story. Elsewhere, median income in the Graduate Hospital neighborhood ballooned to nearly $80,000 in 2016 from just under $38,000 in 2000. At the same time, its African-American population plummeted from 72% to 37% of the neighborhood.

In the eyes of Urban Resources Development Corporation director Joe Waldo, the presence of new additions doesn’t necessarily have to displace homeowners already in the area: “Our feeling is that home ownership makes a resident have a stake in the community. “

The Urban Resources Development Corporation has been adhering to that philosophy for over twenty decades. A nonprofit housing organization formed and managed by eight local churches in Northwest Philadelphia, the group has administered housing programs in Germantown and neighboring Mt. Airy since 1995. The group’s programs cater specifically to families that qualify under its criteria — namely, low- and mid-income residents already in the community interested in repairing or adding to their own homes or low-income residents interested in homeownership. Think Habitat for Humanity’s Home Repair Program, except localized to the neighborhood and funded exclusively from fundraising and donations. In simplest terms, the idea is that if homeowners are able to keep their houses in the area, they’ll stick around.

Their small budget does put an inherent ceiling to the program’s growth — Waldo informed us that the URDC has shifted its emphasis away from housing rehab and more toward home repair and “approximately 80%” of its operating budget is devoted to its Occupied Home Repair program.

In that program, it has assisted over 275 homes since its inception — a significant total, albeit one that evens out to about 11 homes per year.

URDC believes that bringing new faces commercially to the neighborhood via groups like the GSSD can only help groups like URDC see the boost it needs to assist more homes. “Residential and commercial development is intricately related…you can’t have one without the other.”

URDC’s efforts have drawn comparisons to another Philly-based initiative, The Healthy Rowhouse Project. Founded in 2014 by Design Advocacy group, this group is also focused on creating “naturally-occurring affordable housing”, which is housing that is affordable without government subsidies, in the rowhouses that make up over two-thirds of Philadelphia’s housing. Both organizations provide low-income loans for low- to moderate-income homeowners. In addition to these loans, URDC offers grants to some eligible homeowners.

Elsewhere, about 400 people have reportedly gone through Jumpstart Germantown’s developer’s boot camp ran by Northwest Philly real estate group Philly Office Retail — connecting Germantown residents with industry veterans with the goal of having trainees work towards renovating residential and commercial spaces in the neighborhood. Their website boasts of tenants in Mt. Airy, Germantown and elsewhere.

URDC, Jumpstart Germantown and GSSD are only a handful of the groups in the community working towards making sure Germantown develops responsibly. But in a fast-moving and fraught housing market, there’s plenty of anxiety about who new developments will benefit.

“Residential and commercial development is intricately related…” Waldo says. “You can’t have one without the other.”

For Swinson and the GSSD, prioritizing the community already in the area is the key issue. “Philadelphia is changing. It has and is experiencing economic highs and lows. Businesses, institutions and residents see real “opportunity” in this change,” Swinson says later over email correspondence. “But, change must be inclusive and not exclusive. Can we afford to celebrate that Philadelphia and Germantown is becoming more “diverse” without addressing what that really means?”