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Housing & Community « Real Life Stories »
Real Life Stories
Building on Basics
Learn what the FHLBank Pittsburgh is doing to help
build the basics for success in neighborhoods and communities
throughout the region.
Affordable Housing Program Success
Reading, Pennsylvania – a City on the Rebound
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Retail executive Albert Boscov and a cadre of local community leaders have high hopes for the city of Reading, Pennsylvania. Thanks to Our City Reading – a community revitalization initiative born nine years ago – more than 400 homes have been transformed from abandoned or aging eyesores into restored, move-in-ready, first homes for hundreds of families. “Our work is far from over,” according to Boscov, Our City Reading’s founder and guiding light. The goal of the group is to renovate at least 70 properties a year.
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Community Lending Program Success
Franklin Commons – An Uncommon Facility in Phoenixville, Pennsylvania
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About four years ago, David and Marian Moskowitz decided to purchase a 100-year-old vacant and decaying industrial building located in Phoenixville, Pennsylvania and convert it into an educational, corporate and recreational facility called Franklin Commons. The Moskowitzs, owners of Palma, L.P., the real estate management company of Franklin Commons, learned during several months of research that their renovation project was kind of “uncommon” – that is, no private developer in the United States had ever transformed a brownfield site into an “educational mall.”
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First Front Door Success
Stephanie Maddrey Decorates a Wedding Cake - and a New Home
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Like so many other Americans, Stephanie Maddrey and her fiancé, Gary, longed for all the good things life has to offer - a happy marriage, a family and a place to call home.
In October 2006, those plans started coming together for the Philadelphia couple, thanks in part to FHLBank’s program for first-time homebuyers.
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Banking On Business Success
How Sweet It Is – Cake Bakery Expands with BOB Funding
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Seven years ago, Cathy Reppert decided it was time for a career change and went out on a creative limb. After nearly two decades of numbers crunching, Reppert left behind accounting and turned in her calculator for a baker’s hat and sculpting tools. She attended culinary seminars and cake decorating classes, then started her small business, “Truly Scrumptious, LLC”, a bakery featuring specialty cakes and other delicious desserts located in the northeastern Pennsylvania community of Kingston.
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My Money My Life
‘My Money, My Life’ Financial Literacy Program Reaches 1,000 Teens in Five Years
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LaShae Robinson of Pittsburgh’s North Side and Johnray Winstead of Braddock, Pennsylvania are two of 1,000 teenagers who marked a special occasion recently. LaShae and Johnray represented their fellow My Money, My Life graduates as community partners of the financial literacy program announced they had reached their five-year goal: serving 1,000 lower-income 16- to 19-year-olds who are now proud graduates of the after-school initiative.
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Blueprint Communities
Old Jewel Shines Again in St. Albans, West Virginia
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What started out as a vision just a couple of years ago became reality recently when the St. Albans Partnership and the residents of St. Albans and the Kanawha Valley of West Virginia celebrated the two-day grand opening of The Alban, once St. Albans’ only movie theater.
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Homeowner Rehabiliation Program
Collaboration Enables Wheelchair Access for Homeowner in Need
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Barry Clevenger never thought helping his nephew install guttering would change his life. But when the gutter piece he was holding touched electrical wires, the shock caused serious burns and threw Barry eight feet to the ground. Tragically, the accident also led to Barry’s paralysis from the waist down.
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