Inventory of Historic Kent Homes Created by City Managers Office

During the Kent City council meeting on Dec 2, Suzanne Stemnock, the assistant to the city manager revealed that a multi-year project had been completed.  An extensive inventory that accounts for all of the city’s 865 historic homes that are at least 100 years old has been completed.

Stemnock said she was first assigned the project before Kent City Council had asked that the records be researched and compiled into an accessible logbook to document the historic homes in Kent.  This was not her first time cataloging the data of historic homes, she had created a similar logbook in Tallmadge, where she worked as an intern. Kent City Manager Dave Ruller suggested that she start working on one for the City of Kent.

“It is just an inventory of properties that according to the property tax records were built before a certain date,” Ruller said. “We all acknowledge right from the start that those dates are not 100 percent accurate.”

The list contains homes built between 1810 and 1915.

Ruller said that they needed to start somewhere, and using property tax records from the Portage county Auditors website was the best way to establish a database of the historic homes in Kent.

“It was a standard that was available for all properties,” Stemnock said. “Using other methods such as deed research using the staff and resources available would have been very difficult.

Ruller said that due to the recent popularity of restoring old homes and reinvesting in historic properties, a list that was as complete as possible would be helpful to the homeowners.

“We’ve talked about making this available online, but we haven’t figured out a way to upload it without crashing her system,” Ruller said.

The file is large, as each property has been sorted by the year it was built as well as its location in Kent. Each property also contains a photo and summery of the significance of the home.

Stemnock said that in the event the file contains any errors, or has omitted a home that was built before 1916, she would be happy to correct the mistake for the homeowners.

She was also clear that the list of 865 homes simply serves as a starting point for the city to document them, and should not be used as a way to add any value to a property.

Council member Heidi Shaffer  asked if there were any plans to update the information as more homes in the area reach the milestone of being 100 years old, citing her 95 year old Kent home as an example.

Stemnock said that she hopes to work on the book each year, and do a significant update every five years to make sure the document stays current.

Council Member Jack Amrhein also serves as the president of the Kent Historical Society, and said that this will be a great resource for people that are trying to research the history of their property.