(This story has been updated with additional information.)

The Washtenaw County Board of Commissioners voted 7-1 tonight to give the idea of a county land bank authority a second try — giving hope to some that the many blighted and tax-foreclosed properties in the county might see new life.

"As I've been campaigning this summer, I was going around neighborhoods and I noticed a lot of empty houses," said Ypsilanti Mayor Paul Schreiber, adding that a lot of those empty homes had foreclosure signs posted in their front yards.

"In fact, some streets had more of those than they had 'Schreiber For Mayor' signs," he said. "So we have an issue in our county and it's going to get worse. We're not as bad as Genesee County, but we can stem the tide if we act and we empower our land bank."

The county board approved creating a land bank last July, but commissioners decided in March to dissolve the short-lived authority, citing both a lack of funding and a lack of clear strategy.

Commissioners finally reached a compromise tonight with county Treasurer Catherine McClary, who has been pushing for a land bank as a way to repurpose some of the hundreds of properties in the county that are falling into foreclosure.

Through the land bank, the county can take possession of foreclosed properties and resell them. Without a land bank authority, the county's only option for dealing with foreclosed land is to auction it off to the highest bidder — and a lot of times the land goes to real estate speculators out of state, according to McClary.

"We have averaged, for the last 10 years, 11 tax foreclosures a year," McClary said tonight. "This year, it was 391."

County officials say extraordinarily poor economic conditions have continued to increase foreclosures and have established the need to "bank" blighted, hazardous or crime-ridden properties. A land bank, a tool used successfully in other Michigan counties, provides a mechanism to do that until the properties can be put back to productive use.

By a 7-1 vote, the county board approved two resolutions. The first rescinds the board's action from March that directed the treasurer to dissolve the land bank authority. The second amends the intergovernmental agreement for the land bank adopted last July and authorizes the county treasurer to enter into an amended agreement with the state to continue the authority.

Commissioner Leah Gunn, D-9th District, was the only one to object to giving the land bank authority a second try.

"I don't think the land bank will be an effective tool to do what people expect that it will," she said. "The treasurer is very successful in auctioning off the properties and we don't own very many properties. She pays a modest amount per year to maintain them and, to be quite honest, I think the Urban County and Habitat for Humanity, in particular, do a really fabulous job."

Gunn is the chairwoman of the Urban County, a consortium of the cities of Ann Arbor and Ypsilanti and many of the surrounding townships. It formed in 2001 and does work that Gunn and some others fear will overlap with the work of a land bank authority. The Urban County allocates money from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development for housing rehabilitation, shelter and public service programs and projects through Community Development Block Grants and HOME funds.

The seven commissioners who voted to reinstate the land bank were Mark Ouimet, Wesley Prater, Kristin Judge, Conan Smith, Rolland Sizemore Jr., Jeff Irwin and Ronnie Peterson. Commissioners Jessica Ping, Barbara Levin Bergman and Ken Schwartz were absent.

Prior to tonight's vote, the land bank authority legislation was stripped of wording that would have guaranteed a dedicated funding stream. McClary had requested that one-half of 1 percent of interest applied to properties that go into forfeiture in the county be used to fund the activities of the land bank. She estimated that would amount to hundreds of thousands of dollars.

"The money currently goes to the delinquent tax revolving fund, but because forfeitures are at an all-time high, it is money that is coming in at a greater rate than it ever has before, and there are excess proceeds," McClary explained. "The delinquent tax revolving fund pays off the delinquent tax notes, and there's typically several million dollars in excess of that each year that I collect that county commissioners then transfer to their capital projects fund."

Commissioners were unwilling to agree to giving up that money, but several stated they would look for other ways to fund the land bank.

County Administrator Verna McDaniel said funding the land bank has to be a "joint effort." She said there may be the potential for Neighborhood Stabilization Program funding through the Office of Community Development, but all other funding ideas need to be explored.

Ouimet said it seems that other land banks in the state that have been successful have done so with the help of "other-than-government" funding.

"From my perspective, if this is going to work and work well, we probably need to broaden the circle — both in terms of opportunity for funding, but opportunity for input as well," he said. "I think there's other segments of our community that have perspective on it that I think add strength to what we're trying to get accomplished here. So I would encourage this group to bring in organizations like the United Way, Ann Arbor Area (Community) Foundation, some of the banks perhaps as well, and to share your thoughts on what direction you want to go."

Prater said the land bank is in everyone's interest because it will keep property values from falling, which he said was his primary reason for supporting it.

"I think we can make this thing work," he said.

The amended agreement for the land bank removes the county sheriff as a member of the authority and adds a second commissioner position — so now there are two county commissioners on the authority, giving the county board more control. It's expected that Smith and Prater will fill those positions.

Commissioners also took steps to amend the agreement so that the land bank authority can act only with a majority vote of the entire authority board. They also made sure to strengthen the termination language in case the county should decide at a later date it no longer wants to be a part of the land bank.

"We've done everything I think we can. We're going to give it a try," said Sizemore, chairman of the board of commissioners, who was praised for taking a lead role on looking into the merits of having a land bank in Washtenaw County.

McClary was optimistic after the meeting.

"It's been a long haul and I certainly look forward to working with commissioners and working with administration to find dedicated funding, because it would be a sham to have a land bank authority without the funding," she said. "I do not believe that was the intent tonight. I think the intent was truly to put a structure out there that the next step is looking for funding."

Tonight's meeting featured a surprise announcement from a member of the audience. Scio Township resident Thomas Partridge, who ran an unsuccessful state Senate campaign as a Democrat in August, announced his intent to run as a write-in candidate for the 3rd District seat on the county board. He spoke critically of the incumbent, Republican Jessica Ping.

Ping was expected to run for office again this year, but minutes before the filing deadline in May she withdrew from the race, and her sister, Alicia Ping, also a Republican, filed to run in her place. Up until now, Alicia Ping was running unopposed.

Ryan J. Stanton covers government and politics for AnnArbor.com. Reach him at ryanstanton@annarbor.com or 734-623-2529.