New Zoning District Established for Hamilton's Traditional and Urban Core Neighborhoods

Hamilton’s urban and traditional neighborhoods were built to be dynamic, walkable, and to contain a mixture of uses and densities. However, none of Hamilton’s existing zoning districts fully captured this neighborhood design. Therefore, the City of Hamilton has created a new zoning type, the Traditional Neighborhood Zoning Districts, that were created specifically for these areas. The zoning districts take into account the surrounding home’s setbacks and increase the percentage of the area of a lot that can be built on. This change will make it easier for people to build additions, add detached garages, and build new homes, which are popular projects in these neighborhoods.

The Traditional Neighborhood Zoning Districts are primarily single family zoning districts, which reflects the primary land use in Hamilton’s urban and traditional neighborhoods. However, multi-family and commercial uses are conditional uses. For more information, read the article here.

Plan Hamilton adds Second Ward Revitalization Strategy

Members of the Southeast Civic Association (SECA), Miami University Planning students, and City of Hamilton staff have worked together to develop a plan for the Second Ward/Riverview neighborhood. The plan focuses on Pershing Avenue and Central Avenue, but also provides suggestions on broad improvements in the area. The City of Hamilton will be working with the neighborhood to implement the plan. View the plan here.

New Entertainment Mixed Use Zoning District to Encourage Riverfront Development

Through the Plan Hamilton and River Master Plan processes, the City received feedback from the community that residents want to see the river and the riverfront activated with parks, restaurants, recreational activities, and a variety of other public/semi-public uses. The encourage this kind of development, City of Hamilton has established a new zoning classification and implemented it along the riverfront, much of which was zoned industrial prior to this rezoning. The Entertainment Mixed-Use Planned Development (EM-UPD) zoning promote integrated development oriented at a pedestrian scale which provides for a mixture of land uses. This district should produce development that creates an attractive environment and destination for commerce, employment, living, interaction, dining and entertainment and for the residents, workers, and visitors to the City of Hamilton.

Hamilton Announces New Department of Neighborhoods

While neighborhood initiatives are nothing new to the City, there has never been a definitive "home" in any City department for initiatives like 17Strong, the Love Your Block program, or the Neighborhood Enhancement Program (NEP). The new Department of Neighborhoods will consist of four existing staff members who have, in part, contributed to certain aspects of these programs.

The Department of Neighborhoods will create space for dialogue, information sharing, partnership, and action with neighborhood residents, leaders, and organizations to improve the quality of life for the residents of the City of Hamilton. It will also facilitate dialogue, as well as provide connection between neighborhoods and administration, allowing us to leverage community power to solve problems. Finally, the department will create avenues of engagement through online and offline methods to provide open spaces for feedback on City initiatives. 

One process this new department will oversee is quality control of the 311 Service Request System. 311 is the most effective tool for residents to communicate their needs to the City, including to report issues such as potholes, street lights no longer working, nuisance properties, and more. The Department of Neighborhoods will also lead a redesign of the City’s communications efforts across digital platforms (website and social media), print media, and face-to-face engagement with residents. By fostering greater engagement within neighborhoods, and between neighborhoods and city hall, we can create safer and cleaner communities for residents to live.

With all of the efforts of the new department, in the coming months residents can expect to have improved access to information, improved communication from the City, and increased involvement in neighborhood improvement and volunteerism efforts.

Love Your Block Creating Positive Change in Our Neighborhoods

The City of Hamilton is one of ten cities participating in the Cities of Service Love Your Block program. As a program through AmeriCorps VISTA (Volunteers in Service to America), Cities of Service awards $25,000 to each of ten participating cities nationwide. This money is used for mini-grants and resources to support the efforts of citizen groups and local nonprofits to fight property blight through home repairs, lot transformations, and community cleanups. In addition, two AmeriCorps VISTA members serve in city hall to build capacity in our neighborhoods and raise awareness for the program.

In the first year of the program, which began in August of 2018, AmeriCorps VISTA members Brooke Wells and Tyler Cook collaborated with community members and partners to identify homes that needed small-scale repairs, and helped owners make these improvements. In May and June of 2019, nearly one hundred volunteers worked on a dozen homes in the East End and Armondale neighborhoods. Residents painted houses and made minor exterior repairs, removed more than 10,000 pounds of garbage and brush, and assisted owners with yard work and landscaping around the homes.

And it’s just the first year of the two-year Love Your Block program. Brooke, a native of Hamilton, will be hired on to continue working on Love Your Block as part of the new Department of Neighborhoods. The department was created to house our placemaking initiatives and improve communication from the city. Now that the first year of Love Your Block has come to a close, two new AmeriCorps VISTA members joined the new department to continue the work into its second year.

In its second year, the program will improve on the first year successes, and focus on expanding efforts to include the Jefferson and North End neighborhoods. As the Love Your Block starts planning for the upcoming months, the VISTAs and City staff are excited to see what new opportunities the program holds.

Plan Hamilton Citizen Implementation Efforts Have Launched

Community buy-in to Plan Hamilton is critical to the plan’s success. A group of citizens led efforts to implement Vision 2020, the comprehensive plan that preceded Plan Hamilton, and their involvement was a primary reason for positive change in Hamilton. Therefore, Plan Hamilton wants to follow in Vision 2020’s footsteps in regards to citizen involvement. Soon after Plan Hamilton was approved by the City of Hamilton City Council in March 2019, approximately 60 stakeholders came together to talk about implementing the new comprehensive plan.

Since the initial conversation, two groups have formed and are working to see meaningful change within the next 18 months. The first group’s objective is “To Improve Hamilton’s Housing Stock.” They are working on a blight audit that will be used to track improvements and will be seeking improvements to Hamilton’s regulations regarding blight remediation. They also hope to identify and promote services that help Hamiltonians improve their homes.

The second group’s objective is “To Building Neighborhood Leadership and Engagement.” They are working on identifying opportunities for training for 17Strong leaders to help them be as equipped as possible for building engagement in their neighborhoods and creating change. They are also hoping to increase 311 utilization and bring awareness to other City tools that are helpful to residents.

Spooky Nook Sports Champion Mill Celebrates Groundbreaking

The former Champion Paper Mill is being transformed into the county’s largest indoor sports complex. The $144 million development will also include a hotel, convention center space, and space for potential restaurants and other amenities. It is expected to draw over a million visitors to Hamilton each year. Spooky Nook Sports already operates an indoor sports facility in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, where the complex creates $39.2 million in annual off site spending, which is anticipated to help support Hamilton’s local restaurants and shops as well as to increase the number of amenities (more restaurants, shops, hotels, and recreational opportunities) that all Hamiltonians can enjoy. The sports complex is expected to open in 2021.

Spooky Nook Sports Champion Mill is important to a number of Plan Hamilton goals, including the following from Economic Development:

• Activate development along the Great Miami River that is envisioned in the River Master Plan

• Prioritize key brownfield redevelopment opportunities, such as the Champion Paper Mill and Mohawk Paper sites

• Develop and implement creative economic development tools to attract and retain quality of life businesses

Department of Infrastructure: Serving the Needs of Our Community

As far as Cities are concerned, the City of Hamilton is intentionally different. As a matter of fact, Hamilton is the only city in Ohio that owns and operates all four major utilities (i.e., electric, natural gas, water and wastewater). We’re a not-for-profit utility governed by locally elected officials, appointed boards, and our citizens. So, while many utilities are influenced by investors and old practices and whichever way the legislative wind blows, we remain stable. 

Remaining stable does not mean we’re stagnant; our teams are committed to continuous improvement and finding innovate ways to better serve our community. So, in 2017, Utilities and Public Works merged together to form the Department of Infrastructure. The two departments, unified as one, are stronger together and more equipped to provide comprehensive service to our community. More often than not, utility and public works capital improvements go hand-in-hand. As one department, we’ve increased our collaboration, built stronger teams, and removed barriers to become more effective in serving the needs of our community. 

While merging was one significant step to improve our performance, we wanted to go further and opened a feedback channel to the entire community through the Plan Hamilton initiative. Two common themes have been distilled from Plan Hamilton initiative. One, we need to provide better regional and local transportation networks (i.e., improve mobility).  Two, provide reliable and affordable rates across all utilities. As one team, the Department of Infrastructure is committed to achieving those outcomes and much more.