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Baltimore outlines $3 billion whole‑block plan to eliminate vacants and spur neighborhood reinvestment
Summary
Baltimore City DHCD presented a 15‑year whole‑block strategy to eliminate vacant buildings in 42 priority neighborhoods using a $3 billion capital stack and partnerships with state DHCD; officials said coordinated acquisition, demolition, stabilization and small‑developer financing will target legacy residents and leverage private investment.
Kimberly Rubins, chief of policy and research for the Baltimore City Department of Housing and Community Development, briefed the House Environment and Transportation Committee on Baltimore’s “whole‑block” approach to vacant property remediation and neighborhood reinvestment.
Rubins said Baltimore currently has 12,317 legally registered vacant buildings as of Nov. 12 and that only about 7.3 percent of vacant building stock is city‑owned, limiting direct municipal control. To address the challenge, Baltimore and its state partners have identified 42 vacant reduction priority geographies—neighborhood clusters where whole‑block stabilization can restart housing markets and protect legacy residents.
What whole‑block means
Rubins described the approach as block‑level planning: city and state agencies acquire and assemble parcels, stabilize and rehab structures, provide home‑repair grants and estate‑planning services for legacy homeowners, and then dispose of or sell properties to pre‑qualified developers to rehab for resale or rental. She said the city combines acquisition, demolition, stabilization, project finance, lending and code enforcement in a “full stack” development agency model.
Investment scale and outcomes
Rubins said the plan relies on a roughly $3.0 billion capital stack across the 15‑year program and that committed funds for the plan total approximately $1.5 billion to date. She described an example block where roughly $720,000 in public subsidy—$420,000 from city DHCD and $300,000 from state DHCD—leveraged more than $1 million in private investment to rehab properties. She said average rehab costs are around $250,000 per property and projected combined city and state tax revenue gains of $7.4 billion by 2053 under the plan’s assumptions.
Tools and enforcement
Rubins outlined operational tools the city uses: an in rem tax sale foreclosure docket to acquire properties with liens, a new permit system and a publicly accessible vacancies dashboard (BVRC) that tracks interim foreclosures, dispositions and rehabs in near real time. She also said the city will tax vacant properties at three times the normal rate beginning July 1, fiscal 2027, to discourage speculative holding.
Community emphasis and selection criteria
Rubins emphasized that whole‑block work is community driven: selection of priority blocks considers proximity to adjacent stronger markets, strong community engagement, and existing assets such as schools or recreation centers. The strategy pairs vacancy remediation with vacancy prevention—home‑repair grants, estate planning and downpayment assistance for legacy residents to reduce displacement risk.
What to watch
Rubins requested continued state partnership and funding to scale the program, technical assistance for small developers, and flexible capital products to make rehab viable for mission‑driven and small local developers. Committee members acknowledged the data‑driven approach and asked for follow‑up access to the BVRC dashboard for delegation members.
