2019 Partner Grass Mowing Program Open House

The city of Toledo will conduct an open house meeting for potential 2019 grass mowing program partners at 6 p.m., Thursday, Jan. 10 at the Downtown Toledo Train Station, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Plaza, 300 Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Drive. Applications for the 2019 Grass Mowing Program will be made available during the meeting and on the city’s website after the open house. Applications are due at 4:30 p.m., Jan. 31.

The meeting is for applicants to learn about the requirements to become a Toledo grass mowing partner, to hear testimonials from current program partners, and to meet with business development experts and representatives. The city of Toledo Department of Neighborhood and Business Development’s Code Enforcement division used 68 local neighborhood partners to maintain vacant lots and overgrown properties in 2018. Commissioner Dennis Kennedy said the city hopes to identify 97 to 130 neighborhood-based partners to assist cleaning up neighborhoods in 2019.

“We are really positioning this as a microenterprise development strategy for our partners,” Amy Sackman Odum, director of neighborhood and business development, said. “Many of our participants want to move beyond working for the city and we are doing what we can to help those individuals by providing these resources.”

Representatives from the University of Toledo Minority Business Assistance Center, the Toledo Regional Chamber of Commerce, the Ohio Bureau of Workers Compensation, PNC, Key Bank, Fifth Third Bank, Huntington Bank, Lowe’s Home Improvement, and Toledo’s office of Diversity and Inclusion will be present.