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UPDATED: Feb. 26, 2021 at 2:45 p.m.

To Arlaina Harris, the best way to effect change in the East Adams Street neighborhood is by empowering its residents.

Harris, who grew up on Syracuse’s Southside, is the director of community partnerships at Blueprint 15, a Syracuse nonprofit aiming to revitalize East Adams. The area is a portion of the former 15th Ward, a predominantly Black neighborhood destroyed by the construction of the Interstate 81 highway in the mid-20th century.

“What better way to figure out how to inform our policies and our practices than actually investing in the neighborhood and helping (residents) and empowering them to be a part of those solutions,” Harris said.

An organization that works with the New York attorney general’s office recently awarded the city of Syracuse’s team, including Blueprint 15, a $1 million grant. The nonprofit will use the funds to kick-start several anti-displacement strategies in the neighborhood, including hiring neighborhood representatives and establishing a housing trust fund.

The state plans to begin work on the aging highway in 2022, replacing the current viaduct with a community grid that will redirect some traffic onto city streets. But some residents worry that the project will force them from their homes once the viaduct comes down.

Robert Mike, president of the Pioneer Homes Tenants Association and a Blueprint 15 board member, said the nonprofit’s goal is to ensure that the state doesn’t make the same mistakes it made when the highway first went up. Pioneer Homes is a public housing complex that the highway’s construction bisected in the 1950s and 60s.

“We’re going about it a totally different way,” Mike said. “We’re getting information from the tenants, the people in the community, to see what they want. It’s not what we want — it’s what they want.”

Displacement has been a major issue in the area since construction of I-81 viaduct first displaced residents, said Deputy Mayor Sharon Owens, who also serves as president of Blueprint 15’s board of directors.

“Blueprint’s role is to be a partner in what that redevelopment looks like and to ensure that our community does not make the mistake that it repeatedly makes: dislocating the indigenous residents of the neighborhood,” Owens said.

The city’s team, including Blueprint 15, received the $1 million grant from Enterprise Community Partners, a national nonprofit that works with the state Attorney General’s office to direct money won in lawsuits toward the affordable housing crisis.

Enterprise launched its New York state anti-displacement learning network in 2019 with the goal of helping city leaders reduce displacement in their communities, said Jenny Yang, senior program officer in Enterprise’s New York office. The organization put out requests for proposals in 2019 and 10 New York cities, including Syracuse, applied, Yang said.

Blueprint 15, the Syracuse Housing Authority and the New York Civil Liberties Union worked with other cities to learn about strategies to address displacement as part of the year-long application process, Owens and Yang said. The city then worked with Enterprise to determine a plan of action before it could receive the grant, Owens said.

“The team at Syracuse was really engaged from the beginning,” Yang said. “We’re confident in giving the Syracuse team the grant in terms of helping them put their strategies into action.”

The idea to develop a housing trust fund, which will provide flexible resources for homeownership and mixed-income development, came from other communities in upstate New York, Owens said. The city and its partners are still deciding whether the fund will operate as an entity of the city or as a nonprofit, she said.

Blueprint 15 also hopes to use some of the grant money to further its partnership with the Volunteer Lawyers Project of Onondaga County, a nonprofit organization that provides free legal information, assistance and representation in civil legal matters to low-income people.

The Volunteers Lawyers Project plans to hold workshops for residents to help them know their rights and what resources are available to them, Harris said.

“A lot of times people don’t have representation or they don’t know about different resources that are available and sometimes that’s the difference between them being in an even more difficult situation,” she said.

Blueprint 15 also plans to establish a physical location in the East Adams neighborhood so residents have a central location to go to for information.

In terms of ensuring that residents’ voices are heard, Owens said that the work has just begun.

Residents of the East Adams neighborhood have been taking part in conversations about displacement and the I-81 viaduct for decades. For some people, it’s just a debate, but for residents, it’s about where they live, Owens said.

Owens hopes that Blueprint 15 and the city will move forward with their proposed strategies in the upcoming year.

“We’re talking about people (living) in the middle of a transportation infrastructure construction zone,” she said. “The work is just beginning.”

— Asst. News Editor Maggie Hicks contributed reporting to this story

CLARIFICATION: A previous version of this post stated that Blueprint 15 received the $1 million grant. The city of Syracuse team, which includes Blueprint 15, received the grant.

Published on February 24, 2021 at 9:27 pm

Contact Sarah: scalessa@syr.edu | @sarahalessan