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MUNCIE — The state has given the city of Muncie permission to knock down an unprecedented number of homes in historic districts, including some classified as “notable,” “significant” or “outstanding.”

Meanwhile, Muncie Delaware Clean and Beautiful has launched an initiative to turn vacant inner-city lots into gardens with vegetables, trees, and native grasses and wildflowers.

James Glass, deputy state historic preservation officer, sent the city a letter on Nov. 18 agreeing with the city that it is “appropriate” to demolish 30 unsafe and abandoned/foreclosed homes and one commercial building in the Old West End, Emily Kimbrough, Goldsmith Gilbert, and Walnut Street historic districts.

The districts are listed in the National Register of Historic Places, as is the fire-damaged mansion built by Civil War Veteran J.C. Johnson at 322 E. Washington St., one of the properties to be torn down.

Glass told the city that the state’s historic preservation officer’s staff determined that eight of the properties have lost a sufficient amount of historic fabric to no longer contribute to the significance of the districts. The state officials OK’d the demolition of the remaining buildings even though they felt they retained enough historic fabric to still contribute.

According to Bill Morgan, the city’s historic preservation officer, the buildings already are being demolished by neglect. Nobody wants them, most are full of vermin, some are drug houses and all are subject to vandalism and ripe for arson.

In fact, one of the homes, at 212 N. Pershing Drive, built in 1890, was destroyed recently by fire of undetermined cause.

The cost to rehab the structures most likely far exceeds their value if they were renovated.

Bruce Frankel, who lives in one of the historic districts and is an urban planning professor at Ball State University, objected to the demolitions.

“The city has an appalling record of no support for property rehabilitation, and especially … with regard to single-family dwellings,” Frankel told Glass in a letter.