For those of you who don't know, I live in what is called a transitional neighborhood. In the real estate world, this means a neighborhood that is undergoing a change, hopefully toward gentrification. In the practical sense, it means the ghetto.
I shouldn't say that. I have a lovely historic home, that I'm quite proud of, and I have some wonderful, eccentric, diverse, amazing neighbors, with personality, talent, and honestly, I can't say enough good things about the majority of these folks. They are committed to improving the area, one house at a time, and have been tenacious enough that I at least moved in here to join these urban pioneers.
Now the negatives. A bullet did come through my window a couple years ago on Halloween while I was watching Wrath of Khan. I would take it as a commentary on William Shatner's acting ability, but it was too scary for me to make jokes about, even now.
It is a high crime area. The housing values are comparatively low, and currently, only 1/3 of the homes in the area are owner occupied. Not that there's anything wrong with renters, but when historic duplexes are converted to hold single room occupants, and have over 10 units, that's a lot of population density for a very low cost of rent.
One really great thing about the neighborhood, is that the neighbors who are involved in the neighborhood association are working very hard to improve the quality of life. There is also a lot of interest and money coming in from corporate sponsors. I truly believe that in 10 years, this area will be a thing of beauty. I just don't know if I have ten years to give it. But that's another story. So enough backstory, you probably want to know about the interview. Well, maybe you're more interested in where I live, but the interview story is the one I want to tell today.
One of the task forces that I am on in the neighborhood association is a NetZero project. Essentially, this project involves utilizing a Brownfield (area that has been lightly contaminated by a toxin, that is proposed for re-development) to create a solar farm, or other clean source of alternative energy that would be used to benefit the community in some way, be it retrofitting homes in the area so they don't have to pay an energy bill, ever again (! Imagine not having to pay a gas or electric bill.... right?) or putting in a commercial / industrial building with the same benefit.
So without discussing too much more back story, one of the things that a purchaser should do before purchasing a piece of land, is to do an environmental site assessment. In my professional life, I have written a whole heck of a lot of these, so I volunteered to write one - at cost, not counting my time - for the property. This isn't an insubstantial gift. The cost of a basic one ranges from 2-5k. Small potatoes in the grand scheme of things, but there you go. It's a small savings I can offer. They were very excited about it. I still have to work out details, may have to form an LLC, but that's all future discussions.
Anyway, we had our second public meeting today! During the question and answer stage, I was coolly able to discuss lead contamination and the subsequent environmental fate and transport in plants versus animals, and how that differed on a cellular level. Let me tell you, even in retrospect I sounded smart.
Then the reporter walked up to me, stuck a microphone in my face, and asked me, "in your professional opinion, can you please define what a Brownfield is?" I turned red. I turned redder. Then I stammered out something about how I though that she should talk to the state regulator about that. Then I started apologizing profusely about how I was unable to talk to her because whenever anyone from the media started asking me questions my brain started going faster than my tongue, and I sounded like a blathering idiot. Yeah, I said that.
Then she assured me that I wasn't live. And I was all, oh, I know, but you're still going to quote me! And I'm much better at writing than talking in person.
Oh man, it went downhill from there. She ended up walking out, promising she'd get me some time.
I swear, I feel like I'm a relatively articulate, personable human being, who does indeed know what the definition of a Brownfield is (see above, yah?) Holy hockey sticks batman - that microphone... I swear it killed my brain cells.
