Mandy's Pizza in Observatory Hill closing due to crime (better, should)

[Der Schwabe]

Originally Posted by Sciulli

well here's the PDF of people who owe taxes:
http://apps.pittsburghpa.gov/finance...ing_9-2-15.pdf
From.... Department of Finance | Tax Delinquency

specifically the Mandy's location:

NEGRI STEVEN & VERONICA (W) 3906 PERRYSVILLE AVE Commercial
2015: $3,504.77, Prior year: $12,987.34, Prior year interest: $2,548.91

sorry if you felt this was a smokescreen. There's the info and interpret it as you may.

Two other properties:

Property Address, 2015, Prior year, prior year interest:

3032 VIOLA ST 363.01, 353.01, 20.59
3844 PERRYSVILLE AVE 989.18, 3092.58, 420.01

Grand Total Owed Taxes: $24,279.40. Please do check my math.

[norcider]

I posted that link days ago, some people just don't feel like reading I guess. The guy is misdirecting his hostility towards the city, he can't expect the city to post a cop at the entrance to the store 24-7 and for whatever reason the investigation into the 2x robber did not produce results. He owes back taxes on the store and two other properties while roasting Peduto and the cops for not doing their jobs. Cry me a river. If it were my store and it was robbed; I'd have made measures to ensure it wouldn't happen again, and he did not make any changes. By the looks of how he conducts himself in social media he's somewhat unstable and I have a feeling no measure of assistance would ever meet his expectations. It stinks he closed the store but I can't be in his shoes to know what it's been like.

[PghYinzer]

Originally Posted by gg

I agree with this, but I also feeling the tax issue is ONLY a smoke screen to the actual problem. The tax issue shouldn't be part of this discussion, what should be the focus is how to fix the crime in a dangerous area, but I don't think people want to address that part. It is easier to just say, well he didn't pay his taxes, so whatever.

I believe that one of the ways to fix the crime issue in an area is to have more policing and investment by the city in these areas. That costs money. Imagine how much more money the city would have if everyone paid their taxes on time. The tax issue is not a smoke screen, it is simple logic. You want a service that is paid for by your taxes, you don't pay your taxes, and then complain that you are not getting that service.

[gg]

Originally Posted by Der Schwabe

Two other properties:

Property Address, 2015, Prior year, prior year interest:

3032 VIOLA ST 363.01, 353.01, 20.59
3844 PERRYSVILLE AVE 989.18, 3092.58, 420.01

Grand Total Owed Taxes: $24,279.40. Please do check my math.

School taxes don't apply to police funding. It shows his character, but you can't conveniently plug in other taxes to suit an agenda's needs. You can ONLY add in his Pittsburgh tax/Income tax as well if he is late on those to show how much he isn't paying towards police. Not school.

[PghYinzer]

Originally Posted by gg

School taxes don't apply to police funding. It shows his character, but you can't conveniently plug in other taxes to suit an agenda's needs. You can ONLY add in his Pittsburgh tax/Income tax as well if he is late on those to show how much he isn't paying towards police. Not school.

Well he is complaining about the troubled youth that plague the neighborhood, but he is not willing to pay the taxes that help fund their schools either.

[RogersParkTransplant]

Originally Posted by PghYinzer

Well he is complaining about the troubled youth that plague the neighborhood, but he is not willing to pay the taxes that help fund their schools either.

Exactly. Look, this is a complicated topic and I hate that this thread has gotten so ugly. But the letter itself was incredibly self-righteous, and it's hard to read it at face value when we realize that a) they weren't taking commonsense safety precautions at night, and b) they weren't paying their taxes.

We need people to invest in the community, and to do it without blaming politicians for problems that can only be fixed from the inside. It's really sad that this person had a bad experience, but it doesn't mean we all have to give up on Observatory Hill.

[I_Like_Spam]

Hopefully, Mr. Negri does well by concentrating on his other location in West View and that he gets along better with WV's finest and the mayor out there.

Sure, he seems like a bit of a bore from his long screed about crime in OH and the lack of response he got- particularly since he was already packed up and ready to go. It would have undoubtably been classier to leave the personal attacks out, and instead just put up a sign thanking his customers and welcoming them to the other location just a few miles away.

But just because the guy is a bit rude, and might not have been as fastidious in paying his taxes as he could be, doesn't mean that he doesn't have a point and that the mayor's office doesn't need to address the crime and other problems in OH if they want business activity out there

[Uptown kid]

For those that don't know where to avoid I will explain (from a non resident)...
Notice when we talk about crime in Observatory Hill, ironically nobody is really mentioning the section by Perry Hilltop border.
2900-3200blks Perrysville Ave are very nice. So are Norwood Ave, Millroy St, Oak Park Rd and much of Marshall Rd-Viola St.

However the traditionally black-eastern European side has dilapidated some.
WATSON BLVD will be the next North Charles Street... There are spots on the 200blk, 100blk, 000blk that could easily discourage the sterotypical resident from West View, N Brighton Heights, the nicer parts of Perry North, Summer Hill, Allegheny West, Mexican War Streets... Let alone Shadyside, Schenley Farms, Sq Hill, PBz...

The Watson, Venture, Dunlap, Richey, Gould, East, Baytree, Bonvue, Waldorf and the symmetric blocks of Perrsyville Ave section is the section in question. Its not even "block by block" there are a just few drug-violent crime based income houses/apts renters on each of the streets above. Yet there's enough of an issue that collectively the neighborhood is noticeably declining. So much good happens there and yes its a VERY nice community, but drug dealers are moving in and shootings have increased since 2008...
Delinquent youth are logically more of an issue now than ever before, as since 2012 there's only one Northside neighborhood feeder public high school. When Oliver HS housed more than just the selective crowd they hold currently...things were different.
3800blk of Perrsyville has probably suffered bc of this. Sciulli your spots are places I would move my mother to, its good you don't feel the need to move just yet.

IMO the rest of the neighborhood is among the safest on the Northside, and along with Highland Park among the most diverse for middle aged-young middle class families. IMO just as SHP has its issues so does part of OH. Same boat, now who's afraid to live in either? Yet one is getting better, the other is getting worse.
Woods Run, Fineview, Columbia Park (Perry Hilltop), South Brighton Heights (large area), Upper Spring Garden & parts of southern Spring Hill will decline before much of OH... IMO
Even on Watson's most blighted spot its not as rough as the following:
Uptop Snapville's Chester Ave/Wilson Ave/Chattaqua St
Charles St Valley's 2200-2600 N Charles St/Brightridge/Strauss St
Perrysville's 2600blks of Perrysville/Leland/Linwood & Hawkins
Marshall-Shadeland's Woodland/Shadeland/California/Geyer Ave/Thema St
Upper Manchester's Nixon/Adams/Junita/Lake St
Cal-bride Place's Brighton Place/Kirkbride St...
Perry South's Norman/Ligowth/Langly/Divinity/Ridgewood/ Overlook Sts
Quiter "rough" reas like: CNS's Alpine Ave, Carrington St, Sandusky St, Boyle or St Perry Central/Hilltop's Kenedy Ave/Marshall Rd/Maple Ave/Kenwood/Osgood/McIntire or Marshall-Shadeland's Davidson, Hodgkiss, Ingham, Brighton Rd, etc still have the edge on OH in prescived crime & lack of desirability.
IMO
Troy Hill by Gotemann/East Deutschtown/new Jacksonia St/new Federal St are comparable to spots of OH/Woods Run/SE Brighton Heights (notice note all of Southern BH). Yet thet are cleaning up, but they're not so much

[Uptown kid]

Originally Posted by eschaton

I'm sorry to say this, but I disagree.

Observatory Hill has a lot of great old houses which are still in fine condition. But if it's at the point where stores are robbed, not after closing, but during operational hours at gunpoint - if it's at the point where Norcider says that after dark they need to operate with locked doors and a service window - it's not safe.

Again, Spak Brothers is in Garfield, which has historically had a worse reputation than Observatory Hill. While they've had break ins at night recently (all by the same guy, they have him on camera) they haven't had any daytime robberies at gunpoint. Other restaurants, like Pho Minh and People's Indian, have been operating for even longer (I think both were already here when I moved to Pittsburgh 10-11 years ago) and crime hasn't caused them to go under.

The Mandy's owner sounds like a bit of a nut, but neighborhoods which have bad enough safety issues that it becomes dicey for them to be open in the evening are typically not neighborhoods on the rise. I hope for the OP's sake their house continues to maintain its value. But the outer North Side is under tremendous pressure right now. Lower-income units are being lost in Central North Side, Deutchtown, and Manchester due to gentrification, and blight is still causing the loss of units elsewhere, particularly in Perry Hilltop. The problem will likely get worse in the next decade, as the Housing Authority is planning on redeveloping both Allegheny Dwellings and Northview Heights into "mixed-income" communities, which will almost certainly mean the displacement of some residents into the surrounding communities. Given all of that, it's going to be hard to imagine all of the outer North Side neighborhoods to continue to improve or tread water. One or more is going to decline, the same way that the Southern Hilltop and portions of the West End have.

You were one of the first to get it. In fact you alarmed me to it... The inner facing besiness area ghettos are being gentrified faster than others. Outer city limits are declining massively.

Look to the East: the outer Zone 5 "Body Bag hoods" (most of Larimer, Lincoln, Homewood, East Hills)- Central Wilkinsburg, SW Penn Hills, and declining Mon-Yough Valley/Eastern Suburbs. South: Beltzhoover, Allentown, Arlington, Mt. Oliver, Knoxville, Carrick, etc. West: Large parts of Sheraden/Fairywood/Elliott, most of McKees Rocks & now parts of Stowe are rock bottom/massive decline. North: SE Brighton Heights, parts of OH, maybe Bellvue, etc are only next... Even within Central Pittsburgh the spots furthest from the local business districts are the worst off: Garfield by Coloumbo/Brown Way, De Raud St area West Oakland, 3200 Ward St/Fraizer St/Dawson Ct area South Oakland, Middle Hill further from Lower Hill, the declining part of SugarTop, and even Hazelwood's Glen Hazel Projects/Renova St/Monoghela Ave (in between 2nd Ave & Greenfield)...
The maps you and I have made will be outdated in 2020, 2025 if they aren't already. In fact you might wanna check your thumbnail map of Zone 1 now.

[Sciulli]

3800 blk is where I just bought a house and I don't see any issues really. Though I don't know what it was like here 5-10 years ago either and I just came from Hamnett Place in Wilkinsburg so maybe I don't notice blight and trouble areas as readily as others.