Strongest Town 2022, Round 1: Chauncey, OH vs. Norwood, OH
Welcome to this first round match-up in the seventh annual Strongest Town Contest! In this round, 16 towns are facing off, and eight will advance to the next segment of the contest based on your votes. We invite you to read answers representatives from these two cities provided to our questions about economic resilience, citizen involvement, community response to the pandemic, and more. Then vote for the strongest at the bottom of this page.
Can’t decide? If you’re looking for inspiration, check out how we describe the Strong Towns approach.
You may vote once per match-up. Round 1 voting closes at noon CT on Thursday, March 3. For rules, and to follow along with the contest, visit the Strongest Town Contest page.
Note: All entries are lightly edited for clarity and readability.
CHAUNCEY, OH
Entry submitted by: Amy Renner, Diana Burritt, Tammy Hawk, Connaught Cullen, Evelyn Nagy.
What is your favorite thing about your town?
Resiliency! Chauncey has been faced with so many challenges over its lifetime, including losing all mining industry which was formerly its main identity. The evolution has been hard, but thanks to the perseverance from people in our community we have prevailed and found our new identity.
What is the biggest challenge your town faces, and what are you doing to address it?
Economic development. It’s our biggest challenge because it’s new territory for our community to have such promising economic development opportunities, so there's a steep learning curve. However, we have received technical assistance from some great professionals and utilize a lot of local organizations to help us along the way.
What transportation options exist in your town for people of varying ages, abilities, and means? How easy is it to live in your town without regular access to a car? What transportation investments has your town recently made or is it in the process of making?
Chauncey does have access to an ADA-compliant public transit system, including specialized curbside transit for seniors or those with disabilities. Other than that, the main mode of transportation is by car. In 2021, Chauncey adopted a complete streets policy to work towards making our community more pedestrian and bicycle friendly. A large infrastructure project is currently under construction to build a dedicated extension to our county's bikeway, which will offer a safe means of bike travel to two nearby cities.
Tell us about your community's local economy. Who are the key players, big and small, and how do they help your town to be financially strong and resilient? What local businesses are you most proud of?
We are currently rebuilding our economy as a trail town, thanks to our park serving as the trailhead to the Baileys Trail System, which is a mountain bike trail system. Currently, our main players are the local gas station and the administrative office for the regional school district. However, we have a new business owner currently renovating historic buildings, which will include a restaurant and brewery among other potential businesses in additional vacant spaces. We are proud of their work and appreciation for our history. Additionally, a local longstanding business, CeeDee's Handi Mart, has been with us through all the ups and downs so we are likewise appreciative to them for that.
If we took a walking tour through your town, what would we see? How does your community use its land productively to promote long-term financial resilience?
You would see progress! Our county land bank is remediating blighted properties, property owners are making improvements, and new commercial spaces are being renovated so they’re on the up and up. We have a lot of old homes here, which we enjoy because our history is very important to us, but we are working to encourage new builds in our vacant lots to grow the population. Chauncey is currently building a sewer expansion to a 37-acre development site, which will allow us to bring industry back to our community. Our Village also owns over 100 acres of the former mining site, which we are transforming into an outdoor recreation destination, which already attracted tens of thousands of visitors last year.
How easy is it to become an entrepreneur or a small-scale developer in your town? What kinds of support are available for a resident who wants to open a business or build on a small vacant lot?
Very easy! Our Village government is very hands on with potential developers and entrepreneurs and we provide them ample support and encouragement. Our support is by connecting them to the resources they need to make their dream become a reality, and by providing information upfront about Chauncey to aid in their decision making. Most importantly, we connect them to property owners who are interested in selling.
At Strong Towns we believe financial solvency is a prerequisite for long-term prosperity. What do you consider your most potent (existing) tax producing property? Where does your revenue come from? What do you spend it on?
Our most potent property is the local Marathon gas station. Our revenue comes from property taxes, which supplies our general fund, which supports staff and elected officials.
At Strong Towns, we believe that local government is a platform for strong citizens to collaboratively build a prosperous place. How are residents in your town involved in shaping its future? How do residents’ experiences, struggles, and concerns directly inform the projects undertaken by local government? Provide one or more examples.
Energy in Chauncey is high and people are seeing that change is possible and that they want to be a part of that. We're tapping into our community members’ strengths to help build on the things we want for our future. For example, a local carpenter volunteered to build a little free food pantry to be placed at our library, and our community improvement club raised funds for event equipment at the park so that we can hold more robust community events. In 2020 and into 2021, we conducted a widespread community survey and received a huge turnout, which steered our five-year strategic plan for Chauncey's future. We value our community members' input above all others and strive to represent them in the best way possible.
NORWOOD, OH
Entry submitted by: Alisha Loch.
What is your favorite thing about your town?
There are many favorite things, but the size and compactness might top the list! We are an urban small town, nestled inside the city of Cincinnati, but independent. Our size makes it possible for us to come together to achieve great community feats! We know each other and mostly work together. We attend the same few neighborhood schools and our children come together for middle and high school. Our city council, administration, and school board are accessible to hear and answer us, and they live in this shared small community. We are socioeconomically diverse but live together and frequent the same churches, restaurants, schools, and grocery stores. It's really incredible and affords us so much opportunity!
What is the biggest challenge your town faces, and what are you doing to address it?
The community’s perception of itself. In the days of the General Motors (GM) plant and a few other manufacturing factories, Norwood was thriving. Since many of those have closed, most notably GM, money became a huge issue and the city saw significant decline. The money is a real challenge, but greater than that is the challenge of how defeated the population often feels. There's a lack of trust in city administration and in newcomers and a negative shadow has been cast on the city.
To overcome this challenge—still a work in progress—many groups of residents have joined together on multiple fronts! One group of women combated the negative/unfruitful Facebook community groups by creating the intentionally encouraging/productive "Norwood Organized Women (making a difference NOW)" FB group. This group created a scholarship for girls in high school, collected supplies for tornado relief, helped out aging neighbors, supported campaigns for new city leadership, and provided a safe space for women in the community to move our neighborhoods in a positive direction. We also created "Norwood Deserves Beautiful Things" yard signs
Another endeavor was taken on by Norwood Together to organize now three annual historic homes tours throughout the city. These have been a wonderful way to showcase Norwood's beauty and uniqueness and create a sense of pride in the neighborhoods
Residents have created community councils, raised money for micro parks, made an official week for porch parties, and organized many small and successful events that all are welcome to and enjoy (like the upcoming parade organized to cheer on the Bengals).
We are changing the perception and connecting/empowering residents!
What transportation options exist in your town for people of varying ages, abilities, and means? How easy is it to live in your town without regular access to a car? What transportation investments has your town recently made or is it in the process of making?
We have a main bus line through our city; it is not impossible, but not easy to live in our town without regular access to a car, but we are working on that. We have the bones for a walkable neighborhood, with neighborhood schools and corner stores, and we are a city of only three square miles, but it is auto-centric. The city now has an improvement plan for our main thoroughfare to increase its walkability—to make it safer and more enjoyable. We're working to attract more businesses to fill vacant storefronts and give us more to walk to.
We also now have a bike trail bordering our south side that the city and community has supported and we are working to connect that trail up through our city to a park near our middle and high schools. This would be huge and would help increase mobility for our non-driving youth.
Tell us about your community's local economy. Who are the key players, big and small, and how do they help your town to be financially strong and resilient? What local businesses are you most proud of?
We are proud of our many local businesses. UDF and Shepherd Chemical are big players, with factories and several office buildings in our city, and they do much to give back to the community. Kroger is based in Cincinnati (that surrounds us) and also does a lot for our community, providing a convenient place for groceries and also giving back to our community through many donations.
We have several small businesses that the community works to support and they in turn support the community. The Indian Mound Café is definitely one that comes to mind!
A new development we are excited about is Factory 52. It will be an area that has apartments, public spaces, a brewery, and a market house. It is on the site of the very special U.S. Playing Card Factory, an iconic building that once housed a company that meant a lot to this community. They've been able to preserve the clock tower, as they renovated the property. We are very excited for it to be opening soon.
If we took a walking tour through your town, what would we see? How does your community use its land productively to promote long-term financial resilience?
A walking tour through our residential streets would show old, beautiful homes, many of which have been well kept, some of which are being rehabbed, and a few that need attention. We have diversity in our housing stock with single family, duplexes, and apartment buildings. You would see neighbors walking on the sidewalks, frequently stopping to talk to each other. You might see a family of bikers making their way to the bike trail. You'd walk past parks with playgrounds that have recently seen more attention, upkeep, and renovation and our two community gardens.
Along our main commercial corridor you would see signs of improvements, but still with a ways to go. Some storefronts are empty while others are receiving charming facelifts. Along that corridor as you reach the center of town, you would see our central park lined on one side with our historic market house, currently unused. You'd see our well-kept veterans memorial in that park and a beautiful green lawn that just a year ago was a derelict swimming pool. The one-way street along this park is alive with merchants one Saturday a month during the summer during our Off Pike Markets. This area is being used more and more for community events, like this summer's Fridays on the Lawn and this fall's Fall Festival with market and homes tour. Soon on that same corner the area's first cidery will open, a business venture that was assisted by our city's community development corporation (CDC).
We have large office buildings for Paycor, an office park largely for medical offices, and a few retail plazas, Rookwood and Surrey Square. Both of these are working to increase walkability and be more pedestrian friendly
How easy is it to become an entrepreneur or a small-scale developer in your town? What kinds of support are available for a resident who wants to open a business or build on a small vacant lot?
It is getting easier! Our city is revamping its websites to be more user friendly so that you can find the steps to get the appropriate approvals. We have a CDC now and a well-functioning city council that is a great contact point for small-scale developers. The CDC Norwood Together, city council and City administration are all working to develop strong relationships with developers and we are seeing the fruits of that, even though this progress is fairly new. We have the cidery opening soon, a coffee shop, and new home going in where a long-abandoned church once stood, as well as an art studio with an apartment above in a residential area in a building that was abandoned until very recently. We are seeing exceptions to ordinances and ordinance changes that make it easier for businesses to exist.
At Strong Towns we believe financial solvency is a prerequisite for long-term prosperity. What do you consider your most potent (existing) tax producing property? Where does your revenue come from? What do you spend it on?
Norwood has ten properties that have a tax value/acre over $100,000—offices, hospital, retail, hotel, and construction. We have an excessive amount of parking lots (wasted space) but do work hard to have density and vertical structures that maximize tax revenue. We are actively working to bring back corner stores—many of our blocks have unused fronts prime for a comeback. Previous administrations in particular focused on high-earning office spaces for the income tax, but small businesses are getting more attention recently and we think that's good, activating these opportunity spaces.
A good bit of our taxes go to Police and Fire, but during the process of the Financial Recovery Plan, our budget has been cleaned up significantly to focus more appropriately on street upkeep and park improvements.
At Strong Towns, we believe that local government is a platform for strong citizens to collaboratively build a prosperous place. How are residents in your town involved in shaping its future? How do residents’ experiences, struggles, and concerns directly inform the projects undertaken by local government? Provide one or more examples.
We had a stale government for quite some time, but starting with the 2019 elections of a new mayor and several fresh council members, things are really looking up! Council especially is much more representative of the doers in the city, thoughtful about the needs of everyone. The mayor is responsive and uses the grassroots organization that started as a Quality of Life Plan and is now the CDC Norwood Together. The biggest example of projects undertaken are the Montgomery Corridor Improvement Plan and the Parks Audit, both of these identified in the Quality of Life Study in 2018. Montgomery Rd is our main thoroughfare and it is hideous, not pedestrian friendly, and has many empty storefronts. A grant by the CDC paid for a study full of suggestions for traffic calming and aesthetic improvements, and the mayor is actively using this plan. Listening to us in this way was huge. The Parks Audit addresses our many city parks, all of which need work. The previous council paid less attention to this, but the current council is acting on the advice within it, including specializing parks and focusing on central and prominent parks first. We're excited to see this gaining traction and overall excited to be taken seriously and listened to as residents by administration and council.