Our History......Our Board......Our Staff

Our History

In 1979 neighborhood development corporations were still a fairly new idea. The first Cincinnati CDC, Mt. Auburn Good Housing Foundation, was created in 1968 by Carl Westmoreland. By the mid-70's the Walnut Hills Redevelopment Foundation, Avondale Redevelopment Corporation and Bond Hill - Paddock Hills Community Urban Redevelopment Corporation were all beginning their work.

Those Executive Directors, Don Lenz, Jim King and Patricia Garry, all emerging leaders from their respective neighborhoods, found that many other leaders wanted to learn how to foster community control of development in their areas. Thus in 1979 they wrote up the by-laws, filled out the incorporation papers, and filed the 501(c)(3) non-profit tax request for the Neighborhood Development Corporations Association of Cincinnati (now the Community Development Corporations Association of Cincinnati). In collaboration they developed a proposal for then City Manager Sylvester Murray to create the Department of Neighborhoods. This department was vital because, as experience had taught them, the City's Department of Development focused almost exclusively on major developers and developments; downtown. They knew that community success depended on staff whose focus was on the neighborhoods which are the backbone of Cincinnati.


Special Thanks to PNC Bank, our 2011 Platinum Sponsor!

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