Northwood Civic Association President Barry Howell discusses the Frankford Y at the Sept. 20, 2011 meeting.

If action isn’t made on the historic Frankford Y, “it needs to be leveled before something awful happens there,” said Northwood Civic Association President Barry Howell Tuesday night.

“It is becoming dilapidated, and kids are starting to hang out there doing drugs and causing trouble,” Howell said at the civic group’s monthly meeting at St. James Church on Castor Avenue. “It won’t be long until someone breaks into the door and bad things are going to happen.”

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Another Frankford bar with a troubled past due to reopen will get some community scrutiny at a forum next week, a city council representative said Tuesday night.

The former Primo’s Sports Bar and Grille, at 1520 Arrott Street, which sits diagonally from the Arrott Bus Terminal beneath the Margaret Orthodox El stop, has a new owner hoping to reopen it, says Jason Dawkins, who works for City Councilwoman Maria Quinones Sanchez. But coming off a court-ordered closure following episodes of gun violence, greater attention needs to be had, residents have said.

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Northwood Civic Association President Barry Howell at an earlier meeting. Photo by Christopher Wink.

Held a week early so as not to conflict with primary elections, Tuesday night’s Northwood Civic Association meeting focused on quality-of-life issues around the neighborhood, including the application for a grant to remove fire-damage garages from Rutland and Fillmore streets. continue reading »

A class-action law suit against property owners who rent their homes in Northwood could be looming in the coming months, warned neighborhood civic association President Barry Howell at last night’s meeting.

“I don’t know how rentals came to Northwood, but they won’t stay,” Howell said to 26 attendees. “If they don’t own it, they can leave.”

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