THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, April 18, 1995 TAG: 9504180312
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY KAREN WEINTRAUB, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: Medium: 76 lines
Marigolds and wildflowers will soon be blooming in Eleanor E. Knorr's front yard, colorful reminders of what happened there last spring.
The house that 0Knorr's father helped her buy in 1967 got a new lease on life then, when a group of Navy construction workers scraped and painted its worn walls and retiled its roof.
``If it wasn't for them, I would not have a house today,'' said Knorr, a deli manager at Kmart who lives in Aragona Village.
``It looks, I would say, 100 percent better than what it did look like.''
Volunteers from Construction Battalion Unit 145, based at the Oceana Naval Air Station, and dozens of other Beach residents spend a week every April sprucing up houses like Knorr's. Their efforts are part of the annual Reside With Pride Awareness Week, which started Monday.
The week began in 1992 to help maintain the city's housing. In addition to renovating 19 houses, Reside With Pride volunteers have helped civic leagues organize neighborhood cleanups and other projects.
The theory behind the program is that deteriorating houses can pull down entire neighborhoods, encouraging crime, further neglect and a declining tax base for the city.
Fixing up houses creates the opposite chain reaction, said John J. Kunz, a Reside With Pride board member.
``We found in the past that by fixing up even one house, the surrounding neighbors start to take a look and see what they can do to improve their properties,'' he said.
Reside With Pride is a local example of a nationwide trend in which residents and city governments reach out to one another to help solve local problems. In Roanoke, residents have helped cut their tax rate by taking over jobs formerly done by government workers. In Portsmouth, city officials have helped residents begin to ease racial tensions.
The city can't force homeowners to keep their houses looking nice, and homeowners have to take some responsibility for the upkeep of their neighborhoods and their city, Kunz said.
That's where Reside With Pride comes in.
The city provides organizational support and matches grant money with needy people, and volunteers provide the time and energy to get the jobs done. Most of the renovations are done for people like Knorr who are infirm or too short of money to do the work themselves.
Knorr, nearly 60, wasn't proud of the ``drab'' way her house looked, but she lives alone and works practically from sunup to sundown.
She was feeling pretty low about this time last year, after a man down the street took her to court for failing to maintain her house. While leaving the courtroom with a $285 fine, Knorr ran into a city employee who told her about Reside With Pride.
``I owe them so, so much,'' said Knorr, a single mother who raised five children in the Aragona Village house.
Not only did the volunteers make the cosmetic changes, Knorr said, but they also gave her the added pride she needed to keep up the house and plant flowers in the yard.
But Ardell Blanchard, chief of operations for Construction Battalion Unit 145, said the volunteers benefit from the repair program as much as the homeowners. This will be the fourth year his unit has helped out.
Every day this week, for six hours a day, unit members will work on a house on Gindert Drive, stripping roof tiles, closing in soffits, adding fencing, painting walls and installing gutters.
``We have a lot of fun,'' Blanchard said. ``I plan on putting my time in. I like to go out and do my part.'' ILLUSTRATION: RICHARD L. DUNSTON
Staff
Eleanor Knorr of Sancilio Drive in Virginia Beach had her home
painted and its roof replaced last spring by a group of Navy
construction workers participating in the Reside With Pride
program.
by CNB