Building sale lets GHA repay HUD debt, continue on site

Monday, October 14, 2013
The for-sale sign in front of the building at 309 E. Franklin St., Greencastle, gets an impromptu update after it was sold recently to Community Hub LLC, a partnership created by Bob Jedele and Matt Mascioli. (Courtesy photo)

The building that once housed the Greencastle IGA and Red & White grocery stores before being converted into the A-Way Home Shelter is getting a new lease on life.

The property at 309 E. Franklin St. -- still home to the offices of the Greencastle Housing Authority (GHA) -- has been sold to Community Hub LLC, a partnership created by Bob Jedele and Matt Mascioli of Greencastle to facilitate the purchase the building.

New ownership means GHA will remain at the facility, while the possibility of the homeless shelter returning exists, and room for more public needs agencies is an option.

"GHA will be staying in the building," said Mascioli who serves as majors gifts officer in Development at DePauw University, "and our hope is that the homeless shelter will soon return as well and that the building may become a community hub for other similar services."

The sale formally closed on Friday with a purchase price of $170,000 after closing costs, GHA Executive Director Nicole Christlieb said. She noted that the figure "is the amount GHA needs to repay HUD funds that were misused."

What GHA needs the public to understand, Christlieb told the Banner Graphic, is that "selling this building does not mean the program is never going away, it just means we are able to repay our debt to HUD.

"The program could still close down if funds are not increased from the federal government and/or raised locally. Does this resolve our debt to HUD? Yes, it does," she assured.

The portion of funds that had been used from the HAP account to pay shelter employees' wages will be sent to the U.S. Department of Treasury, she noted.

The remainder of funds from the sale will be kept locally to administer the program.

Both Mascioli and Jedele (who runs Jedele Enterpises locally and owns the McDonald's franchises in Greencastle and Cloverdale among his half-dozen restaurants) serve on the Beyond Homeless Board.

The new owners envision the building becoming a community hub -- hence the name Community Hub LLC.

One likely byproduct is the opportunity to offer community programs on site for low-income families.

The latest development is, of course, goods news for the Housing Authority.

"What this means for GHA," Christlieb said, "is that we will be able to continue to provide services for those most vulnerable in our community and throughout the county."

Currently GHA serves 128 families through the Housing Choice Voucher Program and will be able to continue to serve those families.

"Currently with sequestration, our funds have been cut for the program," Christlieb noted. "If we want to serve more families in Putnam County, more efforts will need to be made to raise those funds locally."

With the current shutdown, Christlieb has been unable to communicate with HUD to verify the amount of funds it is still holding for the remainder of this year.

The newly sold building, located at the northwest corner of Franklin and Locust streets, formerly housed the A-Way Home shelter, which opened in July 1996 and closed Sept. 10, 2011 after serving more than 2,500 homeless people over 15 years.

The community has gone without such a shelter since that September 2011 closing.

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  • Thank you, Bob & Matt! Such a solution was desperately needed.

    Perhaps our Township Trustee office could move to this building. Its present location makes it difficult for people without transportation to get to the office.

    Again, thanks!

    -- Posted by mandp523 on Tue, Oct 15, 2013, at 8:14 AM
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