The Morning Journal (Lorain, OH)
Old St. Joseph Community Center sold
After years of planning, the old St. Joseph Community Center in Lorain, has been sold to a new developer.
After years of planning, the old St. Joseph Community Center, 205 W. 20th St. in Lorain, has been sold to a new developer, with future utilization of the building in the works. The building, previously owned by South Shore Community Development Corporation, was sold to A7 Development Group, LLC of North Andover, Mass. for $150,000, according to the Lorain County Auditor’s Office. The assessed value of the property for 2019, which includes both the almost three-quarter acres of land and the building, was a little over $922,000, with a market value of over $2.5 million. County Auditor Craig Snodgrass said rumblings on the sale of the building have been going around since former Lorain Mayor Chase Ritenauer left office last May. “This has been in the works for quite a while,” he said. Jim Janasko of Lorain’s Janasko Insurance Agency, Inc., who sold the building to A7 and was the last remaining board member of South Shore, said he has been working on the project for years. He said there have been previous clients that showed interest in the building but they backed off after walking through and seeing the condition of the building. The building has been without tenants for an extended period of time, according to Janasko. The last tenant was Mercy Health Occupational, which vacated the building for the health system’s new Mercy Health - Bitar Medical Center on Oak Point Road last May. Even closing the building with the new developer took almost a year. He said while any future development of the building is in the planning stages, A7 has shown an interest in improving the city through the development. “They did tell me any development they did would be beneficial to the community,” Janasko said. “They’re very passionate about it. They wanted to do what was right for the city.” He said the improvement of the building will show a further investment in the city of Lorain. “It will eliminate a large portion of blight to the neighborhood and to repurpose an old building,” Janasko said. “I’m excited that we have another development that’s investing in the city of Lorain.”