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Thank you for submitting this request to the City of Detroit. Upon investigation, it does not appear that this work has been approved by the HDC and therefore has been referred to the Buildings, Safety Engineering and Environmental Department (BSEED) for further action.

I live down the street. The woman bought the house for her mother and hired some workers she assumed would get permits, but didn’t. Now the city is going to beat her up for fixing that ruin we were all so happy was finally in good hands. It makes me sad to see this.

Agreed. Ironically, I'd just commented on it to a neighbor - the HDC has been on a jihad through the neighborhood, going after people for work done 7 years ago. IMO, we need to revisit the historic designation. Allowing people to use the power of the state as a bullying tool and forcing people to choose among energy efficiency, maintenance or the real costs of the completely arbitrary decisions of the HDC is completely against the collective benefit. The average income here is $24k/yr. Expecting new wood window replacements or none is not reasonable. Of course, developers seem to get a lot of waivers on these issues. Funny how that works. However, this house is right across from a city project manager, so.... Who got an exception to her project, but who's counting.

Ironically, Ford’s renovations to the depot are further away from historic than anything changed on this house.
Where are the original wooden sash windows that Kahn designed, for example?
The HDC clearly has double standards here.

To clarify because I do not want to be the next target. My deleted comment asked people to talk to their neighbors, check themselves before tattling and the main idea of my comment was for the person who took the time to open their "Fix Detroit" app to tattle on a neighbor to please find a different hobby. With all the niceness and neighborly love that I can muster for finger pointing tattlers I hope you have a great day.

Let's hold up a minute & think about this...I have been in this neighborhood for over 40+ years & helped to secure with other HF neighbors the HF Historic District Designation for our area as another tool to help save our historic housing stock for numerous reasons...for financial incentives for folks to utilize when they rehab a house here (those apartment bldgs. on WGB, Hubbard, Clark St., & WV used historic tax credits as part of the financial packaging to be able to rehab those vacant & blighted white elephants bldgs. Into subsidized affordable low income units), help to stop any demolition of our houses bc as you know, it can take a long time for a rehabber to come along & take on one of our houses, to preserve the exterior uniqueness & architectural character of these historic homes that are longer built anymore, to protect the rehabber/homeowners from being scammed by contractors that hire who do inferior work bc the BSEED Inspectors are looking out for the homeowner to make sure the roofer is doing the work & including all the steps in a reroofing job or rebuilding a porch correctly when structural problems are involved in the work needed, etc.,...City Inspectors are the homeowners "partner" to ensure that whoever they hired does the work properly & to code & does not do inferior work! BSEED Inspectors are our friends! Minor exterior repairs are not required to get a BSEED Bldg. Permit or have HDC Staff approve the work however large exterior work, structural work require Bldg. Permit however, changing the exterior color on the house needs review & approval from HDC Staff but it is painless to submit an email App. for Certificate of Appropriateness (or mail it in) submitting your color choice/s you are changing & believe me, the HDC Staff are great & will advice, give ideas, recommendations, etc.,...The Staff are there to work with the us, the homeowners of these historic beauties not to make our rehab efforts a pain. Anyway, Historic Districts have saved many of houses & Apt. Bldgs. & have attracted great rehabbers/homeowners to these areas to save these houses. So much more can be said about all of the positive benefits of a Historic Designated area that I am grateful & honored for our HFHD in this City!!! Take care, Deb

Oh, reach out to our City's HDC Staff anytime for help or advice or questions at hdc@detroitmi.gov There is a Jennifer Ross there & a Brendan Cagney & probably others. Another piece of history, it was HDC Staff some decades ago that enforced a policy to stop "demoiltion by neglect" thus, required the crazy owner of 3964 W. Layfayette @ corner if Hubbard st. to put a new roof on that house who has kept that house vacant, blighted & still slowly deteriorating for literally over 35+ years!! HF Neigbors including myself are still watch-dogging & babysitting that house & working w/ the DLBA to get that title via the court. If HDC Staff at that long ago time had not got the owners of that house to put that new roof on then that house today, would have huge disadvantage on anyone, any rehabber coming along & saving it bc if the water damage that would have happened without that new roof!!! Again, take care, Deb. debswd@gmail.com

Let's hold up a minute & think about this...I have been in this neighborhood for over 40+ years & helped to secure with other HF neighbors the HF Historic District Designation for our area as another tool to help save our historic housing stock for numerous reasons...for financial incentives for folks to utilize when they rehab a house here (those apartment bldgs. on WGB, Hubbard, Clark St., & WV used historic tax credits as part of the financial packaging to be able to rehab those vacant & blighted white elephants bldgs. Into subsidized affordable low income units), help to stop any demolition of our houses bc as you know, it can take a long time for a rehabber to come along & take on one of our houses, to preserve the exterior uniqueness & architectural character of these historic homes that are longer built anymore, to protect the rehabber/homeowners from being scammed by contractors that hire who do inferior work bc the BSEED Inspectors are looking out for the homeowner to make sure the roofer is doing the work & including all the steps in a reroofing job or rebuilding a porch correctly when structural problems are involved in the work needed, etc.,...City Inspectors are the homeowners "partner" to ensure that whoever they hired does the work properly & to code & does not do inferior work! BSEED Inspectors are our friends! Minor exterior repairs are not required to get a BSEED Bldg. Permit or have HDC Staff approve the work however large exterior work, structural work require Bldg. Permit however, changing the exterior color on the house needs review & approval from HDC Staff but it is painless to submit an email App. for Certificate of Appropriateness (or mail it in) submitting your color choice/s you are changing & believe me, the HDC Staff are great & will advice, give ideas, recommendations, etc.,...The Staff are there to work with the us, the homeowners of these historic beauties not to make our rehab efforts a pain. Anyway, Historic Districts have saved many of houses & Apt. Bldgs. & have attracted great rehabbers/homeowners to these areas to save these houses. So much more can be said about all of the positive benefits of a Historic Designated area that I am grateful & honored for our HFHD in this City!!! Take care, Deb

Denis, I agree that ideally, neighbors should try to talk with their neighbors, try to educate their neighbors about the HDC Staff & give them as much helpful info. on HDC & why a BSEED Permit can protect their investment to ensure the roof, or structural work being done is done correctly by who they hired. However, as you may know, some people these days can become extremely defensive & react negatively towards even their well intentioned neighbors & some neighbors are reluctant or just will not approach a new or old neighbor about such matters especially, when there is no BSEED PERMIT visibly posted on the outside of the house that is being worked on as required for roofs & structural work. I'll be getting a Certificate of Appropriateness soon as I can ever figure out what color to paint my wood trim on my house & get HDC Staff's help & adice but only if I can ever find the right exterior painter to hire to take this 3 story (40ft) ladder paint job on! If anyone has a good & experienced painter willing to take on our tall houses then please share thier info. Debswd@gmail.com thks again for reading. Deb

Really, Deb?
"required the crazy owner of 3964 W. Layfayette..."

Name-calling unnecessary.

You are correct, I should not have stated that descriptive word however, I know the lady owner & I have been one of the neighbors who has babysat her vacant & neglected house for over 35+ years & I can see it from my home's windows. When I was contacted by a group of nuns about the house who wanted to fix it up & live in it & rent it, I passed them on to the Owner. When the Owner did not make a deal with the group of nuns to become her tenants, who would spend Archdiocese $ on the house to do only the basics & needed repair work, then receive an agreed-upon monthly rent to pay with an agreed-upon monthly discount value that would go towards the repaying the funds the Archdiocese spent for the necessary repairs until that was reimbursed in full (no interest charged) & then the nuns would pay the non-discounted rent payment to the Owner! Anyway, I came to the conclusion because I know the Owner well over these 35+ years that she is loca : ) !

Those reasons could be useful. The reality is people, people like you, use the power of the city as a way to carry out petty disputes and bullying. It's not a neutral process because not everyone is targeted equally. Friends of some always seem to do things without scrutiny, year after year. Developers get a pass for other reasons. It's not like Inkwell used historic tax credits to offer affordable housing. SWHS may, but they were offering affordable housing anyway. It hasn't added new options. It's cash strapped homeowners who get screwed and who can't make repairs or improvements because they can't afford the requirements. Homeowners who weren't part of the designation "committee." The argument that it's making things better instead of worse was possible but not reality. In one case a property owner is being told windows put in years ago are going to have to be ripped out and replaced at a cost of $80k. The result is an across the board rent increase. When we consider how much deferred maintenance is happening because people cannot afford the "historic" requirements, the effect of climate change, and also the enormous classism codified in the pretense of preservation, historic districts are a concept that may need reconsidering.

Well, Anonymous, I will have to disagree with some of your points especially, "people like you", etc.,... I have no petty disputes & I do not do bullying! I am an open & straight-up, honest person who grew up here in SWD & as I wrote & shared many specific volunteer actions that I carried out with many other fellow HF residents & homeowners. This dates back to 1982 however, our 2 kids raised here in HF, were the 4th generation of my husband's family who grew up in the house & neighborhood. Thank goodness for Inkwell & Emery of ROI & SWH for saving & renovating the buildings they have renovated & for the healthy mixed-income population that they can serve so that our mixed-income residents can support our small businesses on WVMS, Springwells, Bagley, etc.,...to have a healthy local main street business district. Do we have more work to do for housing, more homeownership, more businesses drawn in, etc.,...? Sure! The work doesn't end, the work is evolving & to make a better quality of life for all, right here in SWD & HF & HR, etc.,... I have to challenge what you say because most typically, the HDC never wants original wood windows to "be ripped out" & replaced bc wood windows are great insulators & HDC usually wants these wooden windows to be reglazed & primed & painted, not ripped out, & the restoration of the old windows can be done by homeowners, older youth being shown how to do this work, any workers can learn, etc.,...to this work! I believe that it is important to increase homeownership in our SWD & HF & HR areas & I believe that grant funding needs to be put into place for the kids who have grown up here & want to be a homeowner here then the grant funds would help those grown SWD kids to help them buy a home here. Homeowners can take advantage of historic tax credits as well through the State of MI, not just developer orgs. Grant funds could also be secured & set aside for monthly rent subsidies for the folks who need the help & grew up here & want to rent here if the affordable or subsidized units are all taken. Many homeowners in HF were & continue to be a part of this neighborhood who worked & work on many, many issues to make things better for everyone & I can assure you that many Homeowners played an active role to secure Historic Designation here! I would recommend to all residents here to get active, do positive things, do something positive for our neighborhood, & help to make a small or large positive difference to help others. Unfortunately, your opinion of historic districts & viewing them as something negative for a neighborhood, saying Historic Districts are classism codified in the pretense of preservation is not true whatsoever! Do your homework & learn the history of all of the endless volunteer hard work by HF residents & homeowners who have given for decades to make our HFHD a better quality of life for all. I can assure you that without many HF residents working together on the diverse issues & problems over the decades, our neighborhood would not be the positive & improving neighborhood to live, work & play!

It’s not like the owners of 415 West Grand Blvd. are lovely long-time residents who can’t afford to keep up their historic home or weren’t consulted and agreed to the historic district designation of some 30 years standing.
This real estate was purchased in December 2021 and appears to be back on the market. Are the owners house-flippers. I can’t make it out.
But they certainly were apprised of the rules for historic properties.
Th

So I guess that it’s not for sale again. This info is from last year. Note that the agent said it’s a great investment property!

Thank you for submitting this request to the City of Detroit. Upon investigation, it does not appear that this work has been approved by the HDC and therefore has been referred to the Buildings, Safety Engineering and Environmental Department (BSEED) for further action.

Thanks for fixing this request!