Barbara Moore said she's lived on Carr Street for more than five years, and though most people on the street know she sells frozen treats from her house, she's never had a break-in.
Right down the street from her well-kept home are boarded-up houses and yards covered in vines and thick growth, but still "it's a good neighborhood," she said.
The Chattanooga Housing Community Development Organization would like to make it better, but after spending $600,000 trying to revitalize and curtail crime in the South Chattanooga neighborhood, it has stopped its efforts along Carr Street. Officials say they can't get the owners of the boarded-up houses to sell them so they can be torn down or renovated.
The owners are in Chattanooga but don't return her phone calls, said Roya Evans, the newly appointed executive director of the housing organization. She also has sent letters to them, she said, but hasn't received answers.
Ms. Evans said the agency, which seeks to be a part of community revitalization efforts and builds houses for low- to moderate-income families, has since turned its focus to building new homes in Bushtown because of the setbacks on Carr Street.
The organization spent $600,000 from December 2006 to June 2008 in the 2600 block of Carr Street, where it renovated one home and built three others. The group partnered with Howard School of Academics and Technology students to build two houses that sold for $110,000 and $115,000.
But just across the street from one of the new homes is a boarded-up house with a porch enclosed by torn screens. Another house on the same side of the street has a front yard full of dead leaves and overgrown vines with cardboard boxes and old furniture sitting on the porch.
"That area (Carr Street) also needs work in terms of neighborhood wellness," said Ms. Evans, who became executive director this week when former director Rayburn Traughber retired. "There are some signs of negative activity around there that need to be looked at."
Ms. Evans said something is needed to stop the drug dealers that can be found selling on the street.
"I wish we could do something, but it needs to be done through police presence or another organization more focused on making neighborhood stronger," she said.
More development partners also are needed to assist financially with revitalization on streets that connect to Carr, she said.
Ms. Moore said the drug activity comes from an apartment complex on the street, and the people who live in the apartments could stop the drugs by not allowing drug dealers to come onto the property.
"The only problem is from those apartments," she said. "They should better screen the people they allow in there. For the most part, everybody up and down this neighborhood minds their own business."
Attempts to get a comment from officials at the Chattanooga Police Department were unsuccessful.
New directorRoya Evans was named the new executive director of the Chattanooga Community Housing Development Organization this week. She replaces Rayburn Traughber, who retired.
Ms. Moore said she hopes the development organization continues its efforts to revitalize the Carr Street area. She said new single-family homes would attract more stable families.
"Carr Street is not the immediate project, (but) it's still on the horizon," Ms. Evans said.
For now, the Chattanooga Housing Community Development Organization is concentrating on three houses under construction in Bushtown. All three are scheduled to be complete by the end of August, Ms. Evans said.
And the organization also plans to turn a vacated duplex in Bushtown into a single family home. Construction will start in August and is expected to be complete by December, officials said.
The houses are expected to sell for $100,000 to $110,000.
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