Council committee presses Land Bank on transparency, schedules resolution seeking public hearing on Gibraltar

The Wilmington Neighborhood Conservancy Land Bank presented program results and plans to the Community Development and Urban Planning Committee and answered sustained questions from council members and public commenters about transparency, inventory management, contractor use, neighborhood impacts and the status of the historic Gibraltar property.

Bud Friel, former city council member and executive director of the Land Bank, reviewed the organization's founding, mission and outputs. He said the Land Bank was created after a 2016 report on vacant properties and noted state enabling legislation followed by a city ordinance establishing a board with state, administration and council appointments. Friel summarized portfolio activity through the end of 2024: 166 rehabs for affordable homeownership, 46 rehabs for affordable rental, 113 nonprofit joint affordable housing projects, 25 side-yard lot sales, 73 unsafe structures cleared, 12 urban gardens and a buyer composition he described as 92 percent minority. He said current staff totals four and reported an inventory of about 62 structures and 70 lots.

Friel described two major projects: the East Side initiative, begun under a prior administration…