By Diane Villano
Times Staff Writer
While naysayers will think otherwise, there are many in Frankford who think the winds once again are shifting for the better — that progress and a better future for the neighborhood already have begun.
A noticeable step in that direction is resuscitation of the Special Service District, begun by city legislation in 1995.
Under the program, business owners are levied a yearly tax to help clean the streets and keep the area attractive.
Until three weeks ago, the fact that many businesses weren’t paying the tax was evident with litter-filled sidewalks.
The SSD board, however, was able to obtain $12,500 in funding from a Communities for a Stronger Pennsylvania grant, facilitated through the office of state Sen. Christine Tartaglione (D-2nd dist.), and a Citizens Alliance grant arranged with the help of City Councilman Frank DiCicco (D-1st dist.).
According to Nancy Cherone, an SSD board member and Frankford Hospital vice president, the funding is providing a clean start.
"Things are looking up. Services have been reinstated once a day, through the special service district. That’s a good thing," Cherone said.
While Thriftway supermarket operator Mark Gilbert has seen improvement since the SSD-arranged street cleaning, he doesn’t think once a day is enough.
"We’re constantly picking up trash," the merchant said. "Frankford has a long way to go. I just don’t know if it’s going to be any time soon."
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Jim McCarthy is doing his best to make Frankford’s turnaround arrive sooner than later. Two years ago, the contractor/developer purchased a property at Frankford Avenue and Gillingham Street that was basically a flop house. He cleaned it out, refurbished it, and today it’s home to the avenue’s newest restaurant, mozaic.
In fact, many a merchant is looking to owner Joan Oliveto’s jazz restaurant as a beacon of hope for the neighborhood shopping district. Gil Pons, owner of Gilbert’s Antique Gallery, recently called it the "last wind in the sail" for Frankford’s struggling business corridor.
Megan Forrestal, president of the Frankford Business and Professional Association, says mozaic not only fills a void for the community, in terms of entertainment and a sit-down restaurant, but for the business community as well.
"We had to go out of the area for a business lunch. Things like that are going to spark other businesses," Forrestal said.
McCarthy first came to Frankford after reading about Kevin Phelan’s Art Place, a gallery that was the keystone for an arts movement on the avenue in the late 1990s. Phelan closed his shop and left Frankford in 2003, but the arts concept inspired the developer.
McCarthy carried that through at a brick building adjacent to mozaic, at 1528 Gillingham St., with three living/workspace studios for artists and his own offices downstairs. He used city facade grants to help with restoration of the building’s historic cornice windows.
The developer will also take advantage of other city incentives as he rehabs the now-decrepit Roxy building across the street, along with other properties on that block.
Facade grants offering rebates of up to $5,000 or $10,000, depending on whether a property has a single address or multiple addresses, are available, explained Mike Kowalski, of the Mayor’s Business Action Team, a city agency that assists and supports businesses under the umbrella of the Commerce Department.
Contrary to popular belief, tax abatements aren’t extended just for new construction in the city. There are also 10-year tax breaks on renovations and improvements to a property, as well as tax-credit incentives for bringing businesses to the city, Kowalski said.
McCarthy already has a few tenants lined up for the Frankford Avenue properties, including a coffee shop. An accounting firm will move into an adjacent property in November. Frankford Family Services also is housed in one of McCarthy’s properties.
"More than anything else," McCarthy said, "I believe Frankford is going to turn around."
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According to Kowalski, what helped the comebacks of Manayunk and Chestnut Hill was that, in both cases, a person or two controlled enough real estate to get things going.
While McCarthy doesn’t have the market cornered in Frankford, he is definitely "creating a node," Kowalski said.
Brothers and master craftsmen Matt and Ian Pappajohn are looking to create a node of their own off the Avenue. They rehabbed the old H. Riehl and Sons warehouse at 4355 Orchard St. and moved their fine-woodworking business to it in January 2003.
The building also houses artists and artisans.
"My brother and I are actively looking for more properties. It’s ideal for people in Center City and the Main Line. Route 1 and (Interstate) 95 make it an ideal location," Matt Pappajohn said.
While Pappajohn recognizes that Frankford is clearly a neighborhood with problems, he believes they stem from violence specific to the city and state’s lax gun laws. Pappajohn also has had the benefit of seeing firsthand how neighborhoods can change, having grown up in Center City when gangs controlled many a street.
Pappajohn’s success brought another relative newcomer to the Frankford scene, contractor/developer Charlie Abdo.
About a year ago, Abdo, along with set designer Brendan Kilroy, purchased an old warehouse at 4300 Tackawanna St.
In addition to Kilroy’s scenery and set design company, the building houses a mix of commercial craftsmen and artisan types, including woodshops, a silk screener and a record distributor.
Taking the plunge into development requires a little blind faith, according to Abdo, who has jumped in early on neighborhood upswings.
His development projects took him to Fairmount in 1975, Northern Liberties in 1980, and, more recently, to Kensington South. This time around he was looking for a larger, more unusual and architecturally significant building.
"Frankford is the next logical spot to find those buildings," Abdo said, adding that he has friends who are now looking for properties. "There’s more of a future for Frankford than some people think."
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Peggy Hoch, president of the East Frankford Civic Association, lives across the street from Abdo’s property and is heartened to see him and Pappajohn restoring area factories.
"There is hope (for the neighborhood.) Behind the dark cloud, there is hope," Hoch said.
In addition to new blood pumping money into Frankford, two Frankford sons, Dan Savage, 35, and Tony Payton, 25, insist that they can offer political hope to the community.
Payton’s profile in the area has increased since he became the Democratic nominee for the 179th district state House seat vacated by Bill Rieger, who is retiring after four decades as a lawmaker.
Payton promised East Frankford Civic Association members at several meetings that he’d be their liaison to the state and maintain an office on Frankford Avenue.
Savage, meanwhile, is the Democratic 23rd Ward leader and the endorsed party candidate for the 7th district City Council seat surrendered by Rick Mariano as he prepared to start a prison term resulting from his conviction on corruption charges.
According to Savage, issues at the top of his "to do" list are public safety, education and revitalization. He also told East Frankford Civic members that he’d get two playgrounds —Deni, at 1381 Ruan St., and Gambrel at 1900 Wakeling St. — into shape.
That sounded great to East Frankford member Thelma Young.
"Young ideas for our neighborhood, that’s what we need," she said.
Frankford’s biggest need, perhaps, is a new generation of community activists with a vision. As such local organizations as the Frankford Community Development Corporation and the Frankford Business and Professional Association regroup, some leaders are starting to emerge.
Kowalski thinks good things will come with the guidance of Forrestal, Frankford Y executive director Terry Tobin, and the Frankford Community Development Corporation’s manager of economic development programs, Tracy O’Drain.
"In a quiet way," Kowalski said, "they’re starting to play a bigger role."
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Tobin, a member of the FCDC board of directors, as well as the board of the special service district, also is optimistic about recent changes at the FCDC and on the political front.
"The CDC is doing things the right way by (consolidating its efforts) with the Main Street and Elm Street programs," Tobin said.
The Main Street program is designed to develop a community’s commercial district with a Main Street manager, beautification strategies and economic and promotional programs for Frankford’s business corridor.
The Elm Street program focuses on revitalizing residential areas near the business corridor. O’Drain will oversee both programs.
Pappajohn is a big fan of O’Drain’s and is hopeful that the CDC can regain its focus on local revitalization.
"She’s dynamic and responsive to the needs of the neighborhood," he said of O’Drain. "A strong CDC makes a strong neighborhood, but they need to be proactive, let businesses know they are there and what services are available to them."
One link for community services, however, is on hold for the time being.
The Frankford Group Ministry Neighborhood Advisory Council closed on Oct. 1, after its contract expired. FGM must apply to restore the contract from the Office of Housing and Community Development. If it is approved, the earliest the program would be in operation again is January, according to NAC coordinator Janet Bernstein.
While Bernstein and NAC associate Janet Carter have been laid off for the time being, the two will stay active with the Frankford Garden Club, Bernstein said.
In July, consultants rolled out the Frankford Avenue Corridor Transit Oriented Development Plan, available online at www.philaplanning.org
City planners had obtained a $150,000 grant from the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission to arrange consultant studies of the Frankford Avenue corridor, in addition to Market Street in Center City, as part of the Transportation and Community Development Initiative.
The goal of the project is to assess the potential for commercial revitalization around the Frankford Avenue transportation corridor. It also calls for conceptual land-use plans, development guidelines and an analysis of the best practices put to use by other communities.
The ambitious plan recommended that Frankford’s leaders look to the Center City Special Service District for technical assistance regarding public safety, suggested changes to street layout, open space areas, a police mini-station, a visitor center kiosk, streetscape and landscape improvements, implementation of a transit-oriented development zoning district and a relocation of the Frankford Avenue and Bridge Street Thriftway market to a location opposite Pratt Street. The site is a temporary lot owned by SEPTA.
Mark Gilbert, who operates the Thriftway first opened by his parents, Harry and Catherine, in 1979, said he hasn’t been approached by a developer looking for an anchor tenant. Even if he is, Gilbert isn’t sure a move would be feasible for the family business, whose 30-year lease is up in 2009.
"Would our volume validate the increased rent? If it was affordable, we probably would, but that’s a big if," Gilbert said.
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There are a lot of ifs to make long-range plans — such as the concepts outlined by the Transportation and Community Development Initiative — work in any community, but especially in Frankford.
"You have to have someone really pushing for the neighborhood," Bernstein said about bringing the plan to fruition.
City planner Mike Thompson understands the community’s weariness brought on by unfulfilled ideas and promises. This isn’t the first time Frankford’s residents have heard a good plan.
"They don’t want more talk, more plans. They have good plans. They actually want to see something get done," Thompson said.
During the ’90s, the Frankford Plan, a five-year strategy that sought to make Frankford a more livable and prosperous community, did make some headway, garnering Frankford attention and significant funding from government entities and private foundations. However, the funding was far short of the estimated $17 million needed to fulfill the plan’s objectives in such areas as business, public safety, arts and culture, and housing, among other themes.
By the time the Frankford Plan 2000, another five-year shot at renewal, was underway, much of the original leadership no longer was in place. Most of them had moved on to other things in their lives.
"Leadership changes slowed positive progress," Thompson said.
After the debut of Frankford Plan 2000, the new leaders failed to command the same energy, support and funding to move the community forward.
Business members and non-profits competed for funding with two decidedly different visions. There were those who wanted to make the community the next trendy Manayunk; there were others who wanted to keep Frankford as it was.
In 2002, city planners completed studies creating a Blight Certification Report, for a possible urban-renewal corridor, and the Frankford Creek Redevelopment Plan, which followed a FCDC proposal for a housing development along the Frankford Creek — the Twins at Frankford Creek.
The city Office of Housing and Community Development recently announced that Impact Services Inc. will work with the Bensalem-based OKKS development to move forward with the project, since the FCDC relinquished rights to develop the property.
The Frankford community also was part of the mayor’s 2001 Neighborhood Transformation Initiative (NTI), which attempts to counter urban decline and revitalize Philadelphia’s neighborhoods.
According to program director Eva Gladstein, NTI has invested about $300,000 in Frankford — among other things, the funding helped with demolition of 24 unsafe properties, stabilizing mid-block properties, promoting new housing development (such as the Twins at Frankford Creek) and cleaning and greening 15 parcels.
As political support is strengthened down the road, the community will be in a good position to go after funding available from a proposed $65 million bond initiative for the Restore Philly Corridors Program, though it still requires formal City Council action.
"Those resources on cultural corridors could (offer) significant improvement," Gladstein said. "Frankford is a corridor that has a number of needs, and a neighborhood with a lot going for it," Gladstein said.
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With economic-stimulus money pending, developers showing interest, and the city’s latest plan for development, Frankford is once again poised to reach for success — if a new round of local leaders can grasp it.
For decades now, crime in Frankford has been cited as an obstacle to a successful business community. But another new face in the neighborhood has plans to fight it on another level, particularly by joining forces with the community.
Capt. Frank Bachmayer took over the helm of the 15th Police District late in the summer, succeeding Capt. Deborah Kelly when she transferred to the Northeast’s 8th district.
Bachmayer has made the rounds at civic organization meetings to hear residents’ concerns, targeted quality-of-life issues such as curfew and truancy, and instituted a program with members of the 15th Police District Advisory Council and the clergy to visit neighborhood blocks where serious incidents have taken place, reaching out to the community with support and information. Bachmayer also wants to organize a Town Watch in the neighborhood.
"He’s the best we’ve had," said PDAC member Thelma Young. "He means business."
Rufus Standefer was a little leery of Frankford at first. When he drove to the community from Center City, the former cinematographer told his wife that he didn’t know if a move to the neighborhood would work.
However, the couple fell in love with the Frankford Friends School, at 1500 Orthodox St., and the fact that they could walk their children to school there. The New Yorkers had heard about the Quaker school online.
According to Alison Standefer, who co-wrote the 1998 award-winning independent film Buffalo ’66, which starred Christina Ricci, the school had a different atmosphere.
"People who go are attracted to its physicality. It’s close to a one-room schoolhouse model, with all different grades playing (together). They love it," she said, referring to her daughters, Marion, 8, and Cushla, 5.
Another factor in choosing the Quaker school was its tuition, which ranges from $5,750 for pre-kindergarten to $7,350 for eighth grade, and is significantly less than others with more magnificent grounds.
"The others had no middle class. This is a school for working parents. It had a nice vibe," she said.
Both parents were also drawn to the structure of the Lower Northeast neighborhood.
"I like it. The architectural bones of this place are phenomenal," Rufus Standefer said. "The community has so many things going for it. It’s laid out in a human scale. The new urbanism is laid out for foot travel."
Standefer agreed that his artistic nature might provide a different perspective than some.
"I do see things differently. That’s pretty clear," he said. "For us right now, we live today. While there’s much room for improvement, we have a wonderful life." ••
Reporter Diane Villano can be reached at 215-354-3036 or dvillano@phillynews.com