CINCINNATI — Brother Tim Sucher carefully unpacked his worldwide collection of nearly 100 Nativity sets, hoping they attract holiday visitors to St. Francis Seraph Church in Over-the-Rhine.
“We go all out here at Christmas,” Sucher said. “We have many trees, we have a Santa collection, we have a Dickens village. And we also have a live Nativity outside, so we have life-size figures and animals. We have sheep and goat and donkeys.”
Inside the church, which will celebrate its 165th birthday in December, this is a magical time of year.
Outside the church, dozens of people sit on steps or milk crates in the tree-shaded plaza at Liberty and Vine Streets. White graffiti is etched on church stonework. People quietly sell and use drugs in the entryways of buildings surrounding the church, undeterred as pedestrians walk by.
WCPO has been following the progress of this neighborhood for months, as Cincinnati police and city leaders try new and repeated strategies to stabilize the area from violence, drugs, and blight.
“We are struggling here greatly over the situation that has arised out in front of our church,” said Sucher, a Franciscan who has been here for 19 years. “There were always people out on the steps of the church, but in the last three years it has become a lot more than just people on the steps … there’s open containers, there’s surely drugs going on out there. It’s really gotten out of control.”
In response, church leaders are installing surveillance cameras on the front and side of its buildings. They also plan to hire security guards to clear out crowds before visitors arrive to see the Christmas displays.
“How does it look when you have lots of people who are drinking and carrying on out in front of your church,” Sucher asked. "What kind of impression does that make?”
While the southern portion of downtown’s historic Over-the-Rhine neighborhood has the city’s best restaurants and hippest bars, life is very different just a few blocks north on the other side of Liberty Street.
An open-air illegal drug market a few blocks from St. Francis Seraph Church became so dangerous that Cincinnati police installed temporary barricades on Republic Street in May for six months to block traffic.
“I suspect that the barricade hampered the drug trade, but it is also clear that drug market activities continue in this vicinity, and efforts to disrupt this activity will also continue – both through law enforcement and other means,” said Capt. Matthew Hammer who oversees Cincinnati Police District One. “The barricade will soon be removed.”
When WCPO visited the barricaded area and nearby streets on Thursday, we observed numerous people who appeared to be using drugs in the mid-morning hours, and others stood next to the barricades wearing backpacks and intensely watching who walked and drove by.
“From my observations, I believe there have been slight improvements also on the 1700 block of Republic and on Green Street, but some additional challenges in the 1600 block of Republic,” Hammer said. “Data from this immediate vicinity does not show a clear trend at this time — either up or down. We are continuing to monitor this.”
Two years after police started the PIVOT program here, which is meant to address small areas of chronic violence, Hammer said in May that there was a 45% drop in gunshot victims.
“Across District 1, violent crime is down 10% from last year. Shootings are down 6%,” Hammer said.
So WCPO asked, “Is the neighborhood safe?”
“I would say it’s getting safer,” said Over-the-Rhine Community Council President Kevin Hassey. “More foot patrols would be helpful. I think they’re manpower constrained, so it’s difficult, but more police officers in the area would be great. They’re just a deterrence when people see the police all the time.”
Police are relying on technology to fill in manpower gaps, signing a contract with Fusus to connect 500 public and private cameras in Over-the-Rhine and the West End.
Sucher would also like to see more police near his church.
“People are out here all the time with open containers. That’s against the law,” Sucher said. “You know we have no trespassing signs … unless there are consequences to your signs or anything like that, who cares.”
Sucher knows of one time when police cited a person for criminal trespassing, and he went to court recently for that case.
He estimated that several hundred people illegally trespassed on the church’s property since it installed signs and painted a property line boundary a few months ago.
“I think citations don’t work here because people don’t pay them anyway,” Sucher said. “I have seen some officers here instead of citing people – tell them to pour that beer out right now. I think that has a bigger effect on people than just giving them a citation.”
While many residents may not feel safer, they think the neighborhood is cleaner now.
Cincinnati Center City Development Corp., known as 3CDC, launched a cleanup blitz a few weeks ago, with more than 100 field workers. The large cleanup blitz is now planned four times a year, in conjunction with the Model Group, which is also revitalizing many vacant buildings here.
Crews removed 210 graffiti tags, 338 stickers and posters, 124 bags of trash, pressure-washed four city blocks, mulched more than 100 trees, and pulled weeds from 35 locations in north Over-the-Rhine. Afterward, 3CDC brought two cleaning ambassadors to work in the area daily, sweeping, picking up trash, removing stickers from signs, and wiping off small graffiti.
“That’s one of the reasons we started this cleaning program just to have more eyes and ears and visibility and maintenance up here,” said David Vissman, vice president of operations for 3CDC. “We do think having the ambassadors up here day to day, we’ve seen a real impact on litter.”
Sucher said the cleaning ambassadors are, “a real blessing,” who have made a huge difference in neighborhood appearance.
He hopes the colder weather discourages crowds from church property and noted that these people are largely not homeless. Many drive up in cars, unload coolers and chairs, and spend all day in front of the church, he said.
The parish is not abandoning its mission to serve the homeless. Instead of using the church for outreach, it will rely on St. Francis Seraph Ministries, which offers a soup kitchen, foot care and other services, Sucher said.
While most parishioners don’t want to fence off the church steps, Sucher said they are considering taking down a large shade tree and applying for a grant to make landscaping changes that will block crowds such as installing rocks and large flower planters.
“Crowd issues in front of St. Francis Church are sometimes a significant issue. Other times they are not,” Hammer said. “For several weeks it appeared to me that conditions were improving, but recently there have been some instances where many people gathered here again. We continue to work with the church, and to work toward long-term solutions.”
As for the barricades, Sucher said while at first, they seemed to discourage drug dealing, he doesn’t think they are effective now.
“Since they’ve been up, they have gotten a lot more comfortable driving up there. They park up and down the street, even in the no-parking zones,” Sucher said. “There's a lot more people out there once again.”
The live Nativity at St. Francis Seraph Church, at Liberty and Vine streets, will be open daily from 1-7 p.m., beginning Nov. 29. The Christmas and Nativity displays inside the church will be open to the public on Fridays from 4-7 p.m.; Saturdays and Sundays from noon to 7 p.m., according to Brother Tim Sucher.
