Developer Bringing Panama City's Old Quarter Back To Life

"Panama City's casco antiguo, as the old quarter is known, is home to 780 historic but mostly dilapidated buildings, from Spanish colonial dungeons and churches to French and American townhouses with wrought-iron balconies built a century ago during the construction of the Panama Canal."

The neighborhood "captured the imagination of K.C. Hardin, an entrepreneurial young American. Hardin, 33, is a leading player in giving the mildewed old quarter a long-overdue facelift, while making sure it retains its local flavor and its longtime residents."

"As he purchases and rehabilitates properties, Hardin's guiding philosophy is to be 'environmentally and socially responsible' to create low-income housing for casco residents at the same time that he makes luxury condos to turn a profit. Hardin lived through the gentrification of old neighborhoods in Miami, Los Angeles, and New York, and shuddered at the thought of pricing locals out of their homes."