HNNA encourages: “Come to the Northside!”

About 35 members of the Historic Northside Neighborhood Association (HNNA) met Tuesday night, April 19th, at the Cleveland Street Presbyterian Church.

HNNA President Bob Cornelius said, “We discussed the need to  renovate and rejuvenate our organization. We talked about short term and long term goals. Naturally, beautification is an ongoing project that is broad and long term in nature. The city is working to enforce the codes for junk cars and, little by little, taking down condemned properties.”

Cornelius said the group discussed the need to create a logo and some branding for the neighborhood, which is the home of the Union County Heritage Museum.

Kaye Parks, a Northside resident, was an active participant in the Tuesday evening HNNA meeting

“The image we want to project,” Cornelius said, “is exactly what we are: a multi-cultural, multi-racial neighborhood, replete with huge oaks, flowering dogwoods and crepe myrtles, roses and rosebuds, magnolias nearly everywhere; owls hooting and frogs singing.”

The Northside has, by far, the largest collection of gracious historic homes in New Albany.

“We want to attract young people to come buy houses and fix them up, as many have been doing in the last few years,” said Cornelius. “We want them to compare the per square foot costs of buying and renovating one of these historic homes as compared to building a new home. The materials in these old homes are of far better quality than what are availble on the market today.”

The Historic Northside Neighborhood Association was established a number of years ago by homeowners who want to preserve and improve the historic character of the neighborhood.

First Ward Alderman, Jeff Olson, who represents the Northside on the city board, attended the meeting, as did Sean Johnson, the director of tourism and marketing for the city of New Albany.