Quality Hill Association Gets Writeup on Success
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By Christine Dunn
Standing guard on Maynard Street. Owners of historic buildings in any section of Pawtucket can apply to have their property included in the city's local historic overlay district. An annual $700 credit in local property taxes is one of the benefits, according to planning director Michael D. Cassidy. Quality Hill, which has been called the College Hill of Pawtucket, has a large inventory of historic houses, including a number of Greek Revival-, late Victorian- and Federal-style residences. It is also a National Register of Historic Places historic district. Walcott Street, which has been called the Benefit Street of Pawtucket, was laid out early in the 18th century and has long been a central street in the neighborhood. Beginning in the early 1800s, many of the city's elite chose to build expansive and fashionable houses there. By the 1920s, "the entire neighborhood was filled with large and often handsome houses fronting tree-lined residential streets," according to a report from the Rhode Island Historical Preservation Commission.
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One of the neighborhood's noted homes is the 1910 William Park House at 24 Walnut St. that was featured last year on HGTV's If Walls Could Talk show. Owner Joe Asermely bought the Tudor-style house in 1998 and has extensively restored it. Another landmark building in Quality Hill is the Read-Ott Mansion on Walcott Street, built in 1842 by hardware merchant John Blake Read. It was later owned by Joseph Ott, founder of the Royal Weaving Co. In the early 1960s, the house was purchased by Pawtucket's Greek Orthodox congregation, and it was used as a parish house for many years. Today, the building cannot be used because it does not meet the standards of the state's fire code. Cassidy said Quality Hill has a mix of single-family, multifamily and rental housing. It also has a neighborhood association, led by Alana Riley (http://qualityhill.wordpress. com/about/), who started an effort to revive the group after moving to Quality Hill last year. Riley said she has focused her attention on community efforts, including starting a Crime Watch group and leading a coat drive and a food drive for the soup kitchen at St. Joseph Church. Cottage Street and Route 95 form the western border of the neighborhood, which is also roughly bordered by Lyon, Bend, and Potter streets. McCoy Stadium and the Memorial Hospital of Rhode Island are near Quality Hill, but the neighborhood's largest institutional presence is St. Raphael Academy, a Catholic high school that owns a number of buildings on Walcott Street. There were just three single-family houses listed for sale in Quality Hill last week: a 1937 Colonial at 89 Walcott St., priced at $239,900; a 1900 Colonial at 240 Walcott St., being offered as a short sale at $269,900; and a 1926 Colonial at 12 Walnut St., priced at $299,900. There were eight multifamily properties listed for sale in last week in Quality Hill, including a number of short-sale or foreclosed properties. Prices ranged from $97,900 for a 1920 bank-owned four-family to $349,000 for a six-unit property built in 1910 at 84 Spring St. POPULATION: (Pawtucket, 2000) 72,958 MEDIAN HOUSE PRICE: (Pawtucket, 2008) $177,000 INTERESTING FACT: Quality Hill was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1984. |
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Nice part of the city and great to walk or drive thru. Kudos to the Crime Watch group |
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Nice piece...live near there...but they do good stuff for the short time involved |