Group home’s sale to displace residents
The purchase of the site housing Chiz’s Heart Street won’t be complete until all of the tenants have new places to live, a representative for the sellers said
The sale of the property where Chiz’s Heart Street operates will not be complete until the group home’s residents have somewhere else to go, the real estate agent for the sellers said.
“We have an accepted offer on it,” Nan Potter said of the property at 256 Washington Ave., which is being sold by owners Stockade Group LLC. “We do not have a defined closing date.” She said the closing is based on due diligence which had just begun, so the sale would not be closing “for a while” yet.
Potter said the owners have had the property for 17 years and can no longer keep it. She said the group home there is operated by Sharon Mary “Chiz” Chisholm, who she described as an employee of the property owners and a “godsend” to the people she helps. Potter said the sellers had hoped someone would buy the property and continue operating the group home, but everyone
who looked at it said they would need the premises to be vacated before they purchased it.
The property must be delivered empty to the new owners as a contingency of the sale, Potter said.
“And that was not done because we wanted to empty the property, but because Chiz wants to make sure that each of the tenants there finds a place to go to,” Potter said. “So, it can’t be sold till that happens. Nobody’s going to be put out on the street.”
Potter said a lot of county agencies are working with Chisholm to relocate the tenants and she believes approximately a third of them have found alternate homes. She said she believed there were approximately 30 people remaining in the home as of Wednesday, April 7.
Chisholm could not be reached for comment.
Deputy Ulster County Executive Marc Rider said in a statement Friday, “The Ulster County Department of Social Services along with our Department of Health and Mental Health is continuing to work with residents to assist them and help provide services for those who qualify. Last month, County Executive (Pat) Ryan released the Ulster County Housing Action Plan and stated that housing is an economic issue, a community health issue, and a moral issue. Ulster County is committed to both assisting these residents and working to help address the housing crisis in Ulster County.”
Potter said Chisholm has also gotten a lot of support from the public and area churches. She said there is a GoFundMe that was accepting donations to help with relocating the tenants. None of the proceeds from that fundraising campaign will go to the property owners, Potter said.
As of Friday, though, donations to the GoFundMe were disabled by the organizer.
There were also videos posted to YouTube asking for help to save Chiz’s Heart Street, and then asking for volunteers to help the residents move out of the facility.