Subsidies for replacing chain link fencing

Here's a great idea:

Residents would get bigger grants to remove chain-link fences from their property, professional rehabbers would become eligible to receive money to fix up historic homes, and there would be no limit on the number of these and other similar grants that residents could receive at one time, under changes to several existing programs the city is planning to adopt soon...

Officials think chain-link fences are ugly and they had hoped to persuade people to start removing them. But they found takers for just $9,000 worth of grants.

The program offers residents up to $1,000, unless they have corner lots, in which case they can get up to $2,000...Mayor Ed Schock said he thinks the grants should be doubled. Most people who have a fence want one, he said, and the current amounts aren't enough to cover both removal and replacement. (Elgin Courier News 6/26/06)

I've thought for some time that the city should subsidize the cost of replacing chain link fencing with picket-type fencing in historic districts. I do think subsidies should be limited to the historic districts. Chain link is in itself not ugly--and is actually I think preferable for certain home styles, but it's not appropriate for the historic districts, where it clashes with the victorians.