A Mantua community center was a ‘safe haven’ for kids. Now it’s falling apart and could become apartments.

Marcus Gary was born and raised in Philadelphia’s Mantua neighborhood. As rival groups of young men fought over turf in the 1960s and ‘70s, he and his playmates grew up in the safe haven of the local recreation center.

He wore a tiny cap and gown for his graduation from the kindergarten there. As a teenager, he played basketball in the gym. When he was old enough, it’s where he went to vote.

“The Mantua Haverford Community Center was so important to our upbringing,” said Gary, 62. “It kept us off the streets.”

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Through the decades, it was a day care center and offered summer camps and after-school programs. It was the site of community fund-raisers, cookouts, and meetings. Neighborhood families hosted Thanksgiving meals and funeral repasts there. Children played ball and jumped rope. They read books and did their homework in the library. Community members took classes in computers, art, music, and cooking.

The two-story community center hasn’t lived up to its purpose and history in a while. It’s fallen into disrepair and is mostly vacant, as the organization that owns it tries to win back the tax exempt status it lost and faces a mountain of property tax debt. The roof is caving in, and ceilings are damaged. Entrances to the commercial-grade kitchen and gymnasium have been sealed off. Classrooms are locked.

For the center’s next phase, a developer is proposing to knock it down and build a seven-story structure with 196 apartments and a smaller community space on the ground floor. The plan, still in initial stages, is going through the city’s zoning process.

Mantua, a neighborhood with limited resources and city investment, is primed for development, especially since the expansion of Drexel University and the University of Pennsylvania has created a need for more student housing. Residents who still rely on the community center for food donations and help with services are wary of anything that might possibly take away resources and/or make living in the neighborhood unaffordable.

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Developer and rental property owner German Yakubov, president of Mantua-based Haverford Square Properties, said the redevelopment is to “make the building what it used to be, which is a resource for a community that currently doesn’t have one and hasn’t had one in a while.”

“The current community center has been in horrible condition,” he said. The reason the property owner has closed off most of the building, he said, is that many spaces are dangerous.

The Mantua Haverford Community Center was so important to our upbringing.

At the moment, the public can access just one hallway of the building, where only one office is open — leased by the Mount Vernon Manor Community Development Corp., which distributes food once a week and helps local residents pay bills and access city services.

The neighborhood has rallied to save the center before, and the community development corporation wants to see the current center revitalized. Several past and current Mantua residents said they don’t want to give up the possibility of the center returning to the size and scope of what it once was.

“As a young teenager, this was a safe haven,” said 58-year-old Michael Thorpe, executive director of Mount Vernon Manor CDC. “We need this to be a community center. This belongs to the community. This belongs to each and every person who needs to come here.”

The lawyer representing the organization that owns the property, also called Mantua Haverford Community Center, did not respond to requests for comment.

The proposal to build homes requires zoning exceptions. And before the plan can move through the zoning process, the developer has to meet with the community. The developer’s lawyer postponed a scheduled Feb. 2 virtual meeting with local community groups because he needed more time to prepare. The developer said he hopes to hold the meeting within the next 30 days.

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Meanwhile, residents continue to go to the center for help with bills and tax returns.

“Public assets like community centers are important in every neighborhood,” district City Councilmember Jamie Gauthier said in a statement. “But at a time when Mantua is experiencing a disproportionate amount of gun violence, it is more important than ever that we focus on keeping this critical and beloved neighborhood resource in operation.”

Since 2013, the community center property has been racking up real estate tax bills, according to the city’s public tax records. The organization that owns the center owes the city more than $175,000.

When Mount Vernon Manor CDC found out that the property was listed for a 2019 sheriff’s sale, it asked the Philadelphia Land Bank to step in.

The Land Bank agreed to purchase the property at sheriff’s sale on behalf of Mount Vernon Manor CDC, because “the use as a community center is in line with our current acquisition policy” and part of strategies to improve the center “and enhance the community at large,” according to a spokesperson for the Philadelphia Housing Development Corp. The CDC would have operated the building.

Then the pandemic started, sheriff’s sales stopped, and the plan stalled.

Under proposed plans, the Mantua Haverford Community Center organization would sell the property to developer Yakubov. The organization would own the community center on the ground floor, and Yakubov’s company would own the apartments and handle maintenance of the entire building, he said.

The plan is to bring back recreation, classes, and child care, Yakubov said. An early proposal submitted to the city calls for the first floor to consist of about 2,300 square feet of community space and about 17,200 square feet of residential space.

Yakubov said he plans to offer about 10 apartments at rents below market rate and the rest at market rate. As part of the project, the developer plans to build about 30 homes elsewhere in the neighborhood to be sold to residents below market rate.

Yakubov said that when the community meeting is rescheduled, he would ask for feedback from neighborhood residents and incorporate as many of their wishes as possible. He stressed that plans are far from final.

Emma Kahn, community development coordinator at Mount Vernon Manor CDC, said the organization is concerned that the number of proposed market-rate units “would jump-start a gentrifying spiral in Mantua that would be nearly impossible to curtail once that kicks off.”

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“It’s clear to everybody in Mantua we need more housing, but we absolutely don’t need more market-rate housing,” Kahn said.

She said the organization’s members don’t care who owns the property but want it to remain a community center.

Gail Coates, 72, spent time as a child at the center and now helps get food to seniors. The center, she said, has been “a great blessing to our community during this pandemic” and has always meant “so very much” to her and her neighbors.

“It was life-changing. It makes a difference for children. And especially when it’s in your community,” she said. “We just had a bunch of dedicated people who saw the need for the community, and we still have those kinds of needs in the community.”

Like many residents, she goes to the center at tax time for help from the Mount Vernon Manor CDC. The organization helps people to pay light, gas, and water bills; take advantage of home repair programs; and get help paying rent and mortgages.

Mantua resident William Williams, 71, had a stroke in 2016 and can no longer write. Lorraine Gomez, who works at the center as a services coordinator for the Mount Vernon Manor CDC, fills out money orders for him and mails his bills. She makes his doctor’s appointments and makes sure he has food when he needs it.

“That place needs to stay open,” Williams said. “There’s nowhere else around here you can go.”

Gomez said the community center has “just so much potential.”

Years ago, she said, “every room in here was occupied, the way a real community center should be. Right now, it’s just being wasted. We could really do some great things out of here.”