What would inspire you to take responsibility for an old, run-down newspaper building on a downtown main street? Can you imagine?
Apparently, there are three families in Beaver Falls who can. Back in 2014, a city representative approached the Beaver Falls CDC about taking ownership of the Old News Tribune building on 13th St, as the previous owner was unable to use it as planned. The CDC officially bought the building for $1, with the hope of renovating of this historic landmark.
Some initial progress was made. The CDC hosted community input sessions to brainstorm ideas for the use of the rehabbed building and obtained preliminary architectural drawings for what the renovated space could look like.
Then disaster hit. After a long spell of inaction, due to the struggle of raising funds for internal gutting, the Trib’s rooftop parapet collapsed and fell into the neighboring alley, damaging the electrical lines of the adjacent business. Thankfully, no one was hurt but the building was suddenly an enormous liability that the CDC could not handle. This is where the story ends…right?
Instead, three local families who were invested in the renovation of the building took a road trip to spend three days learning from a group down in Opelika, Alabama. When they came back, they each committed to completely replace the roof, stabilizing the entire building, and repair the façade.
Since then, the Trib building has become a catalyst project with the county-wide organization RiverWise, the three families partnered with Neighborhood North: Museum of Play, and they began the labor-intensive internal gutting process.
The question remains: what inspired these families to take responsibility for a project like this??