Inside Walnut Hills

project leader: Walnut Hills Redevelopment Foundation -
location: Peebles Corner
(Walnut Hills)
latest update rss: Inside Walnut Hills | Creatives

the project

Walnut Hills Redevelopment Foundation (WHRF) is a non-profit community development organization committed to improving the quality of life for residents in Walnut Hills. For the past eight years we have been focused on our vision to create a neighborhood that is vibrant, safe, healthy, and inclusive for all.

Our residents have asked for a lively retail district with cafes, breweries, restaurants, a grocery, green spaces, and hair salons surrounded by diverse housing options. We now have a clear path to achieve this vision. Our latest success is the acquisition of 3.5 acres in the heart of our business district at Peebles Corner.

At this site, we aspire to build new housing, preserve affordable housing, construct an equitable local food system, and create a vibrant, sustainable public space that is welcoming to all. We are initiating community input sessions to add clarity and detail to these goals. An innovative plan and detailed execution of this capstone development is critical to the long-term success of the Walnut Hills Business District.

In the video series, Inside Walnut Hills, you can see that these results don’t happen overnight. Inside Walnut Hills gives a behind-the-scenes look at our passionate entrepreneurs, business district revitalization, arts and culture, and food access efforts. This amazing ecosystem has been made possible by hard work from WHRF, alongside our residents and partners. We need your support to continue that momentum in all aspects of our work!

Our work includes:

Affordable Housing

Supporting residents at the Alexandra to preserve over 80 units of affordable housing
Creating over 150 units of new affordable housing, including The Scholar House (for single parents enrolled in education), The Manse (for seniors), and Lincoln Gilbert (for families)
Creating over 30 workforce units, incorporated into Paramount Square and Poste developments
Supporting residents at the Alms Apartments in their victory to preserve affordable housing for over 100 families

Historic Building Restoration:

Fire Company 16 (home to Fireside Pizza)
Trevarren Flats (WHRF’s first project in 2016 that created 30 housing units and five commercial spaces, home to Just Q’In)
The Paramount (multi phase project that includes residential and commercial, home to Cincinnati’s first minority-owned brewery Esoteric Brewing and the commissary kitchens for La Soupe and Taste of Belgium)

Community Building

5 Points Alley, turning a blighted lot into an award-winning public space
Building an inclusive Urban Agriculture network that includes seven gardens and foraging orchards
Tackling our Food Desert through partnerships with individuals, businesses, schools, and faith-based organizations to improve convenient access to affordable, fresh groceries

the steps

These funds will enable us to continue to serve the neighborhood through our real estate, economic development, and community building activities. We will:

Create 325 new units of housing (30% will be affordable housing units) with our partner The Model Group at Peebles Corner
Create up to 56,000 square feet of new commercial space at Peebles Corner
Expand Food Access Efforts for nearly 2,000 neighbors:
- Food Friday
- Healthy Harvest Mobile Market
- Create a Community Food Champion who will work directly with residents to expand food access

why we're doing it

The Walnut Hills Redevelopment Foundation has been around for almost 40 years. We were created by the community council in 1977 to develop quality affordable housing in a time when places like Walnut Hills were being abandoned and, in many cases, forgotten.

After decades of assorted success, the organization was at a crossroads eight years ago. We could close our doors or innovate into an organization that reimagines our role as much more. Having chosen the latter, we maintained that we didn’t just want to be a developer. We wanted to be a catalyst for sustainable and positive change. For the last eight years, WHRF has been working to enhance the quality of life in Walnut Hills.

Our Vision is a Walnut Hills that is vibrant, safe, healthy, and inclusive for all. We believe a quality place should be accessible to everyone. We have a relentless desire for equitable change and growth, for community development that values the community organizing and boots on the ground strategy of the past and matches it with the modern day approaches to big, bold and innovative ideas that are driving urban expansion across the country. Through our work we seek to respect and celebrate the history and identity of Walnut Hills, while inviting new stakeholders to the table to contribute to our community’s growth.

We need your help to continue the momentum we’ve built over the past eight years. We need your help to continue and EXPAND our programs to serve more residents. Our real estate, economic development, and community building activities affect ALL of our residents.

budget

DISBURSED BUDGET 2.16.21

$6,750 - Direct Grants to Small Businesses

$13,970.40 - Support for New Programming

$6,750 - Staff Support to Build Community Partnerships

	Normal Fees
TOTAL RAISED =	$28,355.00
ioby Platform Fee	$35.00
ioby Fiscal Sponsorship Fee (5%)	N/A
ioby Donation Processing Fee (3%)	$849.60
TOTAL TO DISBURSE=	$27,470.40

Original Budget:

$15,000 - Direct Grants to Small Businesses

$15,000 - Staff Support to Build Community Partnerships

$30,000 - Support for New Programming

PROJECT FUNDING NEEDED =	$60,000
ioby Platform Fee	$35
ioby Donation Processing Fee (3%) (Donation processing fee does not apply to match funding.)	$1,857
TOTAL TO RAISE =	$61,892
Donation processing fees apply to donations only. 100% of match funding goes to projects. Please note, fees are estimated here and final numbers may change based on the final amount raised and amount of match funding applied to this campaign.

updates