mansfield's performance since 2009 demo controversies

In 2009 the City of Mansfield had its NSP funding suspended by the Ohio Department of Development over their failure to correct their omission of Section 106 historical property reviews in the demolition process. 
As a result of the funding suspension the city agreed to correct the issues and bring its own Community Development Department up to compliance with the federal law.
I recently spoke to Justin Cook at the Ohio Historical Preservation Office to find out how Mansfield has performed in submitting reviews.  He made a check of records and confirmed that the Section 106 Reviews have been coming in regularly from here (as opposed to many years previously of non-compliance).  I updated Justin on what we had been doing here by reviewing demolitions submitted by Codes and Permits. 
In 2011 we had no updates from Codes, but as of the end of 2010 the Historical Society, relying on reviews by the Historic Preservation Commission, had passed on demolitions of 135 properties, and held up demolitions of 3 by commenting on their historical significance.  In one case the city continued the review (331 Prescott), and then dropped the case when the OHPO ruled it eligible for the National Register.  In the other two cases the city appears to have just moved on.
Justin was glad to hear the process was working on both ends.  It's ironic that the Preservation Act which incorporates all of the checks and balances of the review process and provides for citizen input in the spending of federal dollars, actually has next to nothing for enforcement remedies.  In our case, the suspension of the NSP funds worked, but took a disproportionate amount of effort on the part of the OHPO and Ohio Department of Development to bring about.  And the reality of how the process is working today is a far cry from the detailed expectations the Act lays out regarding how the public is a partner in the process. 
Basically neither OHPO nor the Historical Society here in Mansfield has a birdseye view of the process.  So talking to Justin brought things into perspective and I can say with confidence we accomplished positive things.  For a more detailed look at what happened in 2009 you can read the archived blog posts.