A 2-year effort to create a new historic district in southwest Detroit will wrap up public input at the end of this month before submitting a federal application for the designation.
The Detroit City Council Historic Designation Advisory Board has been compiling a list of businesses, buildings and events that lie along West Vernor Highway between the freeway and Ferdinand and around Bagley that have importance to the Latinx community.
A final version will be submitted to the National Park Service for consideration for the historic designation. The park service has awarded $743,531 in grants to preserve the history of underrepresented communities in the country.
Detroit received $50,000 for its application, said Kelsey Maas, a preservation planner with the city. “It is quite a large district,” she said. “We are hoping the designation will provide potential monetary benefits through incentives like historic tax credits and preservation grants.”
The designation could allow some businesses and building owners to apply for historic tax credits and preservation grants.”
That is good news to Paula Anderanin, owner of the Candela Detroit concert venue in the Lithuanian Building on West Vernor. She is renovating the building to include a commercial kitchen and historic tax credits would help her leverage funds for the upgrades, she said. “I am beyond excited this could be a possibility, she said. “That is so exciting.”
Omar Hernandez owns Armando’s Mexican restaurant on West Vernor across from Clark Park. The building already has a historic designation that he used to help finance the renovation of the popular eatery about 25 years ago. He said having a historic district would help the whole area.
“I think it would be a draw and help preserve older businesses,” Hernandez said. “It would be helpful.”
Organizers are looking for businesses, buildings and stories that date before 1980 to include in the project. Not every submission will make the final cut as they already have identified 140 buildings, Maas said. Cultural events, architectural gems and stories of note will be included.
“The (park service) wants to identify important sites and communities and frame them in a historical context.”
Activist Ozzie Rivera served on an advisory committee for the grant. He said the district would be a big boost for the neighborhood and the city. “This is a major undertaking,” he said. “It is important.”
Other similar districts that have been completed or are in the various stages of completion include ones focused on women, children, Arab Americans and the infamous Birwood Wall in the Eight Mile/Wyoming area that separated white and Black communities in the Northwest Detroit neighborhoods.
The park service is striving to ensure that stories such as these are included and protected, Maas said. “There is a strategic focus to diversify what sort of stories are collected.”
If approved, the district would be the first national register district in Detroit specific to Latinx heritage.
Property owners in the proposed district can submit information about their building by completing the survey by the end of October.
