Finally, it seemed, Baltimore had taken the bold action long sought by Poppleton.

Officials declared last summer that after two decades of fits and starts, they were terminating the contract with New York-based La Cité Development. The city would take back the developer’s exclusive rights to several acres land, and residents of this West Baltimore neighborhood would have a say in what happened next.

Then, nothing happened.

Almost a year passed without a clear answer. The city was silent. Meanwhile, La Cité forged ahead, even presenting architectural plans at a public hearing earlier this year. At community meetings, residents wanted to know: Doesn’t Baltimore control the land?

It doesn’t. The city is now acknowledging that most of the land at issue was already spoken for.

Less two months before the termination, La Cité struck a deal with NVR Ryan Homes to build rowhouses and two small condo buildings on 7 acres of city-owned land. Essentially, La Cité is selling its development rights to NVR Ryan Homes, one the nation’s largest homebuilders.

Financial terms of the deal have not been publicly disclosed, but the development rights are likely worth millions of dollars. And it likely means La Cité will stay involved in Poppleton.

“We are working tirelessly to advance this long-awaited development, collaborating with the community and the developer while taking a stand against further delays and shortcomings,” Housing Commissioner Alice Kennedy said in a statement.

Kennedy declined an interview request. La Cité and its president, Dan Bythewood Jr., did not respond to requests for comment. Ryan Sheplee, head of investor relations at NVR Ryan Homes, declined to comment.

However, three people whose lives are tied to the failed revival of Poppleton said they were baffled and enraged by the situation.

‘Push innocent people out of their homes’

Cynthia “Diane” Bell said the relocation check was in her hands for a few seconds, long enough for her to sign it and hand it back as a down payment for a new home in Baltimore County.

It was 2007, and the city of Baltimore had given her nearly $100,000 — a life-changing amount for a woman who had spent most her life shuttling between rentals and public housing.

La Cité said it needed her home demolished to build a dense, upscale community, similar to Manhattan.

In Poppleton, Bell had found stability. She owned a three-story rowhouse for about seven years that doubled as her day care business.

The Baltimore County home had a monthly mortgage payment triple what she paid in Poppleton. And Bell no longer had her day care business. Bell feels like city housing officials strong-armed her into buying the home.

Soon after moving, she declared bankruptcy. She lost the home in a foreclosure sale, had a mental breakdown and resorted to sleeping on a couch in a friend’s basement. Today, the 71-year-old woman lives in a small, government-subsidized apartment in West Baltimore.

La Cité has finished just a single apartment complex made up of two buildings. Bell’s old home in Poppleton is an empty lot.

And Poppleton redevelopment plans have been drastically scaled back under La Cité‘s deal with NVR Ryan Homes.

Architectural renderings show a rowhouse community that largely mirrors what existed when Bell lived there — and what the city of Baltimore spent millions of dollars knocking down. The new homes are expected to cost between $300,000 to $500,000, far beyond what Bell can afford.

“You push innocent people out of their homes so somebody else can make money?” Bell said. “That’s wrong.”

At a Poppleton community meeting last year, Bell said, she pleaded with Kennedy for help. She said she hasn’t heard from the housing commissioner.

“Where’s the remorse?” Bell said, her voice cracking. “I don’t understand Ms. Kennedy. How do you sleep at night?”

‘They have stuck the knife in deeper’

In July 2022, Sonia Eaddy sat in the living room of her three-story rowhouse — the home that Baltimore had been trying to demolish for years — and listened to Kennedy and another top housing official.

Eaddy’s neighborhood association, Poppleton Now, had prepared a news release advertising a press conference at City Hall, where residents would demand transparency and accountability in the city’s dealings with La Cité.

Kennedy was asking her to cancel the event, Eaddy said, and stand with the mayor instead.

For the first time in almost two decades, Eaddy had leverage. Her home had become a powerful political symbol.

As part of the proposed redevelopment of Poppleton, Baltimore had relocated more than 100 households, demolished buildings and created blocks of dead space. But Eaddy refused to leave, and, eventually, she became the last homeowner remaining.

According to Eaddy, Kennedy said the city was on the verge of amending its long-running deal with La Cité — and they needed her support.

A few days later, Eaddy stood behind Kennedy during a sweltering press conference near her home as the housing commissioner declared a “day of celebration in Poppleton.”

With TV cameras rolling and a jubilant crowd before him, Mayor Brandon Scott said the city, after painstaking and expensive negotiations, had spared Eaddy’s home and corrected a historic wrong.

“We hear you,” Scott said. “We understand your concerns and want to move forward with this project in a way that does not sideline your voices.”

Following the press conference, Eaddy and other residents met regularly. They gathered around tables with markers and maps, plotting out how they wanted to develop the land that surrounded them.

They made sure to protect a community garden and a pocket park. Under La Cité’s deal with NVR Ryan Homes, both will be demolished and built over.

To Eaddy, 60, this fight was always about more than her home. It was about an entire neighborhood. Now, she feels crushed.

“I’m just done with our mayor and our housing commissioner,” she said. “I feel like they have stuck the knife in deeper.”

‘I really wanted to make a difference’

In 2023, Brett Flickinger came to a community meeting at Morning Star Baptist Church. He had never lived in Poppleton and had no family connection to the area. But the retired city planner did have regret.

“I just still lose sleep over this because I really wanted to make a difference,” Flickinger said. He said his “hands were tied” because of the city’s “crazy” deal with La Cité.

Flickinger, 72, had his first stint in the department of planning in the 1970s. He left to pursue other planning and organizing work. Decades later, Flickinger said he went by the eastern edge of Poppleton, and tears came to his eyes.

For decades, Martin Luther King Avenue had been an invisible wall, separating West Baltimore from the investment and development taking place downtown. In 2005, the University of Maryland crossed that barrier by completing the first building of its BioPark — a life sciences campus expected to create jobs and bring cutting-edge research to the area.

Flickinger rejoined the planning department in 2006 — the same time Baltimore formalized its deal with La Cité — and took up his old post. He imagined new residents fixing up old rowhomes. Communities would work with the city to plan infill developments. Rejuvenation would spread through Poppleton and into Franklin Square and Harlem Park.

Most importantly, Flickinger said, Black families would see their wealth rise as West Baltimore regained its vibrancy.

Then reality set in.

Flickinger spent 15 years watching the investment stall out at the site of La Cité’s proposed apartment complex. He grew incredulous as the city kept granting extensions to La Cité, even as it failed to deliver on basic promises.

Under its original contract with the city, La Cité said it would fix up 28 vacant houses in the surrounding blocks for displaced residents like Diane Bell.

But La Cité never renovated those homes, and the city later amended its deal with the developer to delete the rehab requirement.

The residents of Poppleton — current and former — deserve action, Flickinger said, and they deserve a voice in planning their communities.

“Neighborhoods belong to the people in the neighborhoods. They don’t belong to the city. They don’t belong to the developers.”