28 units at Codorus Homes, a public housing development, are slated for demolition.
A loan air conditioner sits in a window overlooking South Penn Street. Neighboring panes in the units of Codorus Homes, York’s first public housing units, are hidden from view by plywood — boarded up because there is no one left in those homes to look out them.
By Oct. 1, that air conditioner will be gone. So will the family that switched it on during sweltering days, inched the temperature gauge up and down and maybe sat and listened to it whir and sputter as they ate dinner or watched television late into summer nights.
Soon after that family “transitions” to a different public housing or affordable housing development in York, the unit will be sealed, and marked for demolition like 28 other units in the neighborhood, said Craig Zumbrun, interim executive director of the York Housing Authority.
Then, a bidding process is expected to begin. Contractors and demolition companies, architectural engineers and development firms are all needed to transform the site from blocks of crumbling structures into a greenway park.
Demolition, once started, could move quickly, Zumbrun said.
“Our obligation was to have the site cleared by the end of June 2014, and I’m sure we’ll beat that,” he said.
Meaning that in a matter of months, a city neighborhood will be snuffed out and the dirt that it kept beneath foundations and wood will be turned over to serve a new purpose.
