MIDDLEPORT — Middleport, Pomeroy, Syracuse and rural areas surrounding the villages are included in the area where a second round of federal stimulus money, designed to rehabilitate abandoned and foreclosed properties and sell them to new homebuyers, will be spent.

Gallia-Meigs Community Action Agency has been approved as one of five agencies in Ohio to receive funding for local work. Director Tom Reed told Meigs County Commissioners last week the agency will work in Meigs, Vinton, Scioto and Pike counties, although the amount of funding available is not yet known.

Gallia County did not meet the foreclosure rate criteria required to participate, Reed said.

Reed said allowing the Gallia-Meigs agency and others in more rural communities is part of a state strategy to share the funds with less populous areas. The program is primarily designed to address areas of very dense blight, caused by foreclosure abandonment, in urban areas.

The census track allowing Meigs County to receive funding includes the three villages as well as outlying areas, including the Bradbury, Five Points and Flatwoods communities.

The grant will allow the purchase of homes in foreclosure and rehabilitate and re-sell them to first-time homebuyers. The agency is now about to build a new home in Middleport on property where an abandoned home once sat. That home will be offered in a lottery among pre-qualified first-time homebuyers and was paid from the first round of NSP funding.

Reed said he understands the second round will include less for new construction, focusing the program instead on rehabilitating abandoned homes and selling them to first-time homebuyers.

In addition to the new home construction component now about to get underway, the program also provided funding for demolition of condemned homes in targeted areas of Middleport and Pomeroy.

The distribution of funds is based on foreclosure rates and unemployment data in a particular census track, or area. The number and percentage of homes financed by a subprime mortgages, and the number and percentage of homes in default or delinquency in that area are also considerations when funding is determined.

The funding is provided through the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Community Development Block Grant program under the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008.

The grants can be used to acquire land and property, demolish or rehabilitate abandoned properties, and to offer down payment and closing cost assistance to low- to moderate-income homebuyers — those at 120 percent of area median income.By Brian J. Reed

BReed@Mydailysentinel.com

MIDDLEPORT — Middleport, Pomeroy, Syracuse and rural areas surrounding the villages are included in the area where a second round of federal stimulus money, designed to rehabilitate abandoned and foreclosed properties and sell them to new homebuyers, will be spent.

Gallia-Meigs Community Action Agency has been approved as one of five agencies in Ohio to receive funding for local work. Director Tom Reed told Meigs County Commissioners last week the agency will work in Meigs, Vinton, Scioto and Pike counties, although the amount of funding available is not yet known.

Gallia County did not meet the foreclosure rate criteria required to participate, Reed said.

Reed said allowing the Gallia-Meigs agency and others in more rural communities is part of a state strategy to share the funds with less populous areas. The program is primarily designed to address areas of very dense blight, caused by foreclosure abandonment, in urban areas.

The census track allowing Meigs County to receive funding includes the three villages as well as outlying areas, including the Bradbury, Five Points and Flatwoods communities.

The grant will allow the purchase of homes in foreclosure and rehabilitate and re-sell them to first-time homebuyers. The agency is now about to build a new home in Middleport on property where an abandoned home once sat. That home will be offered in a lottery among pre-qualified first-time homebuyers and was paid from the first round of NSP funding.

Reed said he understands the second round will include less for new construction, focusing the program instead on rehabilitating abandoned homes and selling them to first-time homebuyers.

In addition to the new home construction component now about to get underway, the program also provided funding for demolition of condemned homes in targeted areas of Middleport and Pomeroy.

The distribution of funds is based on foreclosure rates and unemployment data in a particular census track, or area. The number and percentage of homes financed by a subprime mortgages, and the number and percentage of homes in default or delinquency in that area are also considerations when funding is determined.

The funding is provided through the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Community Development Block Grant program under the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008.

The grants can be used to acquire land and property, demolish or rehabilitate abandoned properties, and to offer down payment and closing cost assistance to low- to moderate-income homebuyers — those at 120 percent of area median income.