City of Vicksburg launches housing revitalization initiative

VICKSBURG, Miss. (WLBT) - The City of Vicksburg launched a Housing Revitalization Initiative with the help of the NAACP.

The goal is to provide safe and stable housing in the city. The program also provides a helping hand to residents who can’t afford to fix up their homes.

“We are helping people that can’t help themselves,” said Mayor George Flaggs.

The mayor is excited about a new partnership with the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People in Vicksburg.

They are launching a new Housing Revitalization Initiative to rehab homes in communities and remove blight.

“It gives us a brighter look in the city and keeps the value in the neighborhood up,” said Mayor Flaggs.

Bobbie Bingham Morrow is the President of the NAACP Vicksburg Branch.

She says this new initiative is needed now more than ever.

“So, we found out when we could actually help individuals in the neighborhoods to refurbish their homes and bring them up to standard and to code that was one of the major initiatives. We said let’s do it, let’s work that,” Morrow said.

The board of aldermen has allotted $300,000 of American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding to revitalize homes within the city.

“We are targeting a group of people that cannot out afford to buy the materials, to pay for the labor and do those things,” said Mayor Flaggs.

NAACP leaders say they have identified the first three neighborhoods in the city that could use help.

“We are looking at Martin Luther King,” Morrow said. “In that area they have already installed a civil rights park in that area. We got Marcus Bottom that is one of the oldest areas in the city. There is a lot of history in Marcus Bottom, this music history in that area, as well as civil rights history, and so the area that is adjacent to Bowmar Avenue, which is another area we are going to deal with it.”

The city and NAACP point out that this is just the start. The goal is to will also help breathe new life into parts of the city affected COVID-19 pandemic.

They also say it has to be a community effort to make this program a success.

“This is a project we can all do,” Morrow said. “Find out where you can be a benefit, where you can paint, hammer nails, where you can plant flowers because we’re going to make it like an old fashion barn raising, where everyone can come and bring their talents and help us build up our community.

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