The Road to Hell
My name is Chris and I'll be your driver

In the latest episode of the Sillyman Hour on Time Warner Local Access Cable, Smitherman wanders a residential area of Avondale bemoaning all the vacant abandoned housing. Besides breaking into the Mr Rogers theme repeatedly he tries linking the blight to a proposed health clinic (shot down by Smitherman's Republican comrades) and the proposed streetcar.
I agree that the buildings need to be occupied & so does the city. The city's law department has been vexed with banks like Wells-Fargo & Deutsche Bank and their cavalier handling of their properties.
Smitherman has a plan, tho, and as he repeatedly states, "It's not rocket science". The city should use eminent domain to seize the properties and then sell them to responsible people for $1 each.
He doesn't mention that the government is required to compensate property owners a fair value for their properties & that the process is long and costly. He also ignores the fact that his plan is unconstitutional. Remember the (other) Gamble House that did get saved in Norwood? You can't use eminent domain to transfer property from one owner to another.
The city can, however, use infrastructure to make places more convenient to live in. That's the core of the streetcar plan that Smitherman so despises as bringing in new residents is characterized as gentrification. Wouldn't that be the result of his unconstitutional plan for Avondale? Or maybe the issue is the right people.