An area that has seen "demolition by neglect," according to one lifelong resident and activist, is seeing hope through a convergence of revitalization projects aimed at turning the neighborhood around, without pushing the neighbors out.
"It's real important to change the neighborhood, and we with open arms embrace the changes," said Bruce Mundy, who grew up in Bluegrass-Aspendale. "We know the changes are needed."
On top of the already announced Knight Foundation Legacy Project underway along Third Street near Midland, a group of young leaders in the 2006-07 Leadership Lexington class collaborated with city officials to establish the Isaac Murphy Memorial Art Garden in honor of the first three-time Derby winning jockey and neighborhood resident.
"This parkÖ speaks of what this community once was and what it can be still," Mundy said of the era in which Murphy owned seven acres of land in the neighborhood that then was home to Lexington's race track.
Mundy said the park, to be located at the Third and Midland intersection, can be the foundation used to return his neighborhood to prosperity. "This is a very proud community. I grew up here, and so I remember this community when there were businesses and stores and it was a thriving community. Ö I've seen the community go through changes. I've seen the really proud, great community deteriorate; I've seen that happen. So I know what it was and I know what it can be. I think this park will be an anchor spot for this community and an anchor spot for Lexington."
Andrea James, council woman for Lexington's First District, credits members of the Leadership Lexington class that took on the creation of a city park as its project. At a press conference unveiling designs for the park, she called it the "revitalization of Third Street. This is bigger than just image right now; it's a legacy that's being created right here."
"The young leadership certainly helped make this possible," said David Melanson a PR specialist with UK and member of the 2006-07 Leadership Lexington class who credits "perfect timing" with the project's ability to get to the design and fundraising phase. "There's been a lot of excitement about the Third Street corridor lately," he said, referencing the Knight Foundation's work, the project to renovate the Lyric Theater and the redeveloping of the Bluegrass-Aspendale area, including a new elementary school.
Urban League Development Director and Leadership Lexington class member David Cozart described the work done by the class as critical. "They displayed a commitment and a sustainability that is unprecedented, and the exciting thing to me about it is it says or represents the community-mindedness that the young leadership has. It is a diverse group; it's a group that is involved in a broad spectrum."
And that hodgepodge of young civic-aimed classmates, Cozart said, has ended up looking to improve an area most of their peers would have nothing to do with or no reason to be a part of.
"I see an area that has been on a back burner for whatever reason, I see some distress, but I see most of all hope and change," Cozart said of the area, which is still largely neglected, but undoubtedly on the way up.
But members of the Leadership Lexington class and neighbors say that is where they have to be extremely cognizant that revitalization doesn't turn into gentrification.
"You can transform and revitalize simultaneously, and you do that by respecting and including a community, including that history," Cozart said. "You fold into (the existing neighborhood) the paradigms that are more productive and the paradigms that some say are more progressive."
Mundy, who works with youths in the Bluegrass-Aspendale Teen Center, said, "We have to guarantee that the people who live here stay here. Ö If you create businesses, then you create jobs; if you create jobs, then you create people who are financially stable and so can stay."
Melanson said the hope is the park will be up and running in advance of the World Equestrian Games to draw visitors into the neighborhood, but in order for that to happen, the group will need to finish raising $1.7 million. So far there has been corporate support for the park from Toyota, Keeneland and Smuckers, and other donations are welcome through the Friends of the Isaac Murphy Memorial Art Garden in at the Bluegrass Community Foundation.
For more info on the park or to contribute, visit www.IsaacMurphy.org.