This is crazy stuff! I am kind of shocked because I really did not believe the predictions of snow.
Here is my neighbors’ house:
We probably won’t see snow like this again for many years to come.
****update: 1/28/14. ^^^Apparently I was wrong. It wasn’t years but only a couple days before we got it again! Lol.
I can’t believe I have not posted about the Louisiana Residential Historic Rehabilitation Tax Credit process on my blog! Wow. Ok, so here goes. This is information on the Residential Historic Rehabilitation Residential Tax Credit program for the State of Louisiana (and more specifically, Alexandria, LA). I have included links to the boundaries of the local historic districts in Alexandria, the PowerPoint presentation explaining the program; and a really unfortunate and corny video I did for speech class a couple years back. The poor video had to have certain pieces in order for me to get the grade. I had to have an audience, I had to start out with a song, so forgive the unnecessary elements of the video and fast forward to :25 so you can concentrate on the presentation portion. If you have any questions, you can contact me, or the State office. The wonderful people who administer the Historic Rehabilitation program for the State of Louisiana are always on hand to answer questions, are patient and I truly enjoyed working with them. So, if you have any questions, you can also contact them.
KEEP IN MIND: This process is for the RESIDENTIAL program only. I do have knowledge of how the commercial credits are supposed to work. That is a different process and a different percentage. I have not had personal experience with that process and decline to comment on how it works. I have had personal experience with the residential program and can vouch that it worked/will work, exactly how it is outlined.
Without further ado:
Powerpoint Presentation :Louisiana State Historic Rehabilitation Tax Credit Program
Louisiana State Office PDF Flyer: LA Tax Incentive breakdown pdf
Alexandria, Louisiana, Local Historic and Cultural Districts
For National Register districts or individual listings click here to search: National Register of Historic Places
Here is the official link to the Louisiana Office of Cultural Development Division of Historic Preservation where you start the process. All of the applications and information is listed on this page.
In depth answers regarding the Louisiana State Historic Rehabilitation Tax Credit Program.
And last but not least, my very unfortunate video. If you would like to bypass the most annoying part, fast forward to :25. If you want to follow along with what I am presenting, you will need to have the Powerpoint open or printed out and have either read or have handy the above PDF. I saved it for last, because if you have read the information above, it really is not necessary. However, if you are visual and like to have the information presented to you, here you go: Youtube Video, explanation of program
If you live in Louisiana, but you do not live in a locally designated historic area, or a National Register historic district, or a building or home that is in a National Register historic district, but you feel your home is historic. What you would need to do in order to be eligible for the program is create a local historic district through your municipality. It can either be designated as such by your City Council, your Police Jury, or whatever municipal authority your home is under. I have never done this and do not know what is required. You do have to present the information to the municipality and then either you or them, or maybe a cooperative group, drafts the necessary paperwork for it to be adopted and made an ordinance and then filed with the assessor’s office and the State of Louisiana. If anyone has ever done this before, feel free to leave a comment. Another thing you could do is ascertain whether or not your house would be eligible for listing on the National Register. If it is, you can take the necessary steps to try to have it listed. Please visit the National Register site (link posted above) for more information on that process.
Last night was very sad for Preservationists in Cenla. The Thompson-Hargis home was irreparably destroyed by fire. At this time we know that it started in the back of the house and according to KALB, the cause was arson perpetuated by a 13 year old girl. An arrest has been made.
A security guard has been posted at the house remains to deter vandalism until a future disposition of the house can be determined by the family. Built in 1907 (some documents I have say 1902) without the benefit of a house plan by B.F. Thompson, a Canadian, the Thompson-Hargis mansion survived a total of 105 years until its historic reign was brought to an untimely end on September 9, 2012. Rivaling the beautiful and well preserved mansions on St. Charles Avenue in New Orleans, this mansion was the last one of its kind in Alexandria.
Mansion Row, as it is locally named, will not be the same. RIP grand lady.
The above pictures were taken via iPhone as it was unfolding. For pictures taken this morning, click here to be redirected to the WeSawThat blog.
P.S. I wrote a short post spotlighting this property in 2008 and made the comment that it would not last much longer in the state that it was presently in. It has been a top post for the past two days, understandably so. I am sad that this was a fulfilled prophecy. 😦
I am off for the summer, but I came in to work while Vivian is at Grandma’s house, to help out my employer. I was flipping through the Cenla Focus and saw my picture…hahaha. This totally cracked me up. I knew the photographer was buzzing around but I didn’t know who he was or the picture was going to go. This cracks me up on several different levels. Firstly, because people are probably wondering “Who is this chick?”….secondly, because I lend a whole new definition to the term “white”; and thirdly because right under me is my beloved friend, R. R. Sr. The man who called me up, cussed me out and slammed the phone down in my ear. Shame, shame. Let’s just say I was new to town, I had no idea who this family was and I was not trying to make their life miserable, I was just concerned about my neighborhood.
Anyway…it was my laugh for the day.
Andrea
"House of the Leaning Pole"
Has a certain ring to it! We have kicked around ideas for a good name for our house. We have also thought about renaming our house versus naming it by last name of the original owner. BUT, I think “House of the Leaning Pole” is definitely descriptive. Everyone knows where my house is…its the one with the big leaning pole out front. This is a very old picture. Almost 4 years old. I swiped it from Google Earth. Since this picture, we had a bad ice storm and it caused the pole to crack at the base and it is leaning even farther now. I am informed that it is AT&Ts pole and I am further informed that AT&T has been notified about it. I just hope it does not fall over onto my house or fence.
Come on AT&T….please come and replace this pole????? 😀 Please????? It will save me the embarrasment of naming my house something dumb. We don’t want that.
Andrea
Oh my….this is usually the time of year that I dust my blog off and then tackle about 10 projects at the same time. 🙂 This year is no exception. I have accepted the nomination of Vice President of the Historical Association of Central Louisiana. Thank you for your faith in me. Among some of my duties, I will be writing a couple National Register nominations this year and working with property owners regarding tax incentives and rehabilitation of their properties. I also have my property to work on and submission of a NR nomination is forthcoming in that area. I finally have everything straight with the SHPO (State Historic Preservation Office) regarding what they need from me and what I need to do.
My laundry room and kitchen are being “finished” by a carpenter as we speak. Steven and I just ran out of steam labor wise and have been too involved in other things to get it finished. So, we hired a good friend and excellent carpenter to come and finish what we started.
In adoption news, our home study was finalized yesterday. All of the paperwork that our social worker needed from Mississippi came in and we can finally move forward with completing our dossier and sending our documents to China. Within the next thirty days I hope! National Register nominations pale in comparison with submitting a dossier to the Chinese Government! Wow!
Many good things are in the works!!! It is spring! My favorite time of year. I am ready to rock Cenla!
Andrea
I just received this. When I get more details, I will edit this post. This is a picture of my house sometime in the early 1900’s. Note the horse and buggy parked out front. I am soooo thrilled to have this picture! The turret (the cone) is long gone and I have had an architect draw up some plans to restore it. This picture is better than the other one I have. I hear rumors that there are several pictures in existence, just tracking down who has them has been the hard thing.
Here is the only other picture I have of this house: Click Here.
YAY! We are finished painting the windows at our bungalow rent house. You may have remembered us complaining about it here. Anyway, here is the before picture when we bought it over a year ago (this picture is before we did ANY work to it) and here is the now picture after the windows have been painted:
Before...
...After
I know it is not a huge improvement. But it does look a lot better from the street.
Also, yesterday evening, we pressure washed OUR house in preparation to sand and scrape the porch rails and porch walls to paint. Here are Vivian’s pictures. She was bored, so I gave her my camera to play with:
Yay! My legs. At least I got a pedicure yesterday.
And this is how we ended our day:
Vivian and Mercedes
Notice me in the background painting while my daughter is loafing! 🙂 Oh to be four again. Hope you got everything accomplished this weekend that you had on your list!
Andrea
Re-Posted here with permission by Lamar White, Jr.
To see the original post, click here.
Throughout the past few weeks, I’ve been discussing Alexandria on a personal level and the potential and opportunities presented by the community’s renewed spirit and by the nearly $100 million infrastructural project known as SPARC.
Last week, Daniel Smith, Melinda Anderson, and I took a tour of Alexandria. We were scoping out provisional historical districts and properties, in preparation for a visit by the State Historic Preservation Office (which was covered in today’s newspaper). Just as an aside, a designation on the National Register of Historic Places does not prevent a structure from being demolished. However, it is an incredibly important distinction, paving the way for various tax credits (when applicable) and demonstrating the importance of a place’s history and local significance.
Our tour was instructive.
We began in Lower Third. There’s a neighborhood near Augusta Street that is approaching the 50 year threshold, and though it probably does not possess the “wow factor” needed for inclusion in the National Register, it appears to be a stable and healthy working class neighborhood, a place in which pride of ownership shows.
We then dipped down to Samtown/Woodside, an area in obvious need of attention, to check out a small area that we had initially believed to be nearing 50 years old (but have subsequently determined otherwise). As I mentioned in a previous post on walkability, Samtown/Woodside has some obvious obstacles– in large part, this is because the area was developed and subsequently annexed into the City of Alexandria, which means that site development requirements were practically non-existent. There are very few sidewalks, and in many places, the roads are entirely too narrow.
I know many, many people who have lived in Alexandria for the entire lives and have not yet been to Samtown or Woodside. And I am personally ashamed that it took me nearly twenty years before I had ever visited this important area of our City.
Which leads me to a broader point: When discussing the needs of our community, we must be objective. Our needs should be discussed collectively– as a community; they should not be steered by the wants and demands of a small group of individuals. The table should have enough seats for all of us.
If you have no notion of the needs of Lower Third, Samtown/Woodside, and South Alexandria– tangible and obvious needs- then you likely have a distorted view of our most pressing priorities.
Much of Alexandria is blighted and in need of immediate attention– both programmatic and infrastructural.
That said, there is a reason I personally believe preservation is particularly important– not just in the area around the Alexandria Garden District but throughout our fair City. To be sure, I think it is foolish to be stubborn on this issue– sometimes, quite simply, some things are beyond saving. But when we can, we must preserve.
After Daniel, Melinda, and I left Samtown/Woodside, we toured an area near South Lee Street– remarkably similar to the character of Samtown/Woodside, and then on to an area known as Sunken Village, which, believe it or not, is technically outside of the city limits. Sunken Village is, in my opinion, a unique urban problem. As its name implies, the neighborhood has a tendency to flood, and although it appears to be primarily occupied by young families, its infrastructure is ancient. Children crowded the streets due to a lack of sidewalks. Something needs to happen there. It’s outside of the City. There’s no homeowner’s association. Much of the neighborhood is rental property. It’s prone to flooding.
When you tour Alexandria in this way, you have a notion of the scale of blight. It is not isolated to a single area; it exists throughout the City, and therefore, it is a City-wide problem.
Working together means acknowledging our shared challenges.
I implore you: If you haven’t seen your City, go out and see it.
Lamar White, Jr.
Unfortunately, it is work on one of our rent houses and not our own house 😦 The Alexandria Housing inspector tested the exterior paint on one of our bungalows and it tested positive for lead paint. Bleh….. I scraped and painted one window on the house before finally calling it quits. I intended to go back and scrape and repaint them all. However, after that one experience, I moved scraping and painting windows up to the number 1 spot on the list of Ten Things I Found I Absolutely Hate To Do. It is now unavoidable. So, I am going to scrape windows again (double bleh!!) and, if the weather permits, paint them black. The house is white, trimmed in black, with a red door. It is very cute. Painting the window trim black will sharpen up the house and give it a little more curb appeal.
I am also thinking about painting the overhang black too. Is that too much? White perhaps? It is good condition and my renter likes it. Thankfully I do not have them on EVERY window! I find that overkill! It seems these overhang things became popular around the 50’s or so. I saw something ridiculous last week, it was a house with the overhang shading HALF of the window, and on the outside of the overhang were shutters! HA! I am going to go back and get a picture. It will definitely go in the What Were They Thinking archive.
Happy Friday everyone!
Andrea
***UPDATE*** I scraped two windows before wimping out and hiring a guy. Hey, his bid was $10 a window for scraping all the paint off and making it smooth enough to prime and paint. Can’t beat that. He finished yesterday, so this Saturday I will be priming and painting the windows.
I am going to paint the overhang white and paint the two black stripes back on. You can see a little remnant of the black stripe on each side of the awning.
Hopefully (or, it is to be hoped) that I will have this project completed this weekend and will post pictures for your viewing pleasure then.
Perpetual Renovator 
