MANVILLE: Upkeep of homes concern residents

By Mary Ellen Zangara, Special Writer
   Residents voiced their concerns at Monday’s Borough Council meeting about the houses and properties in the Lost Valley section, hit hard by flooding last summer.
   Residents want borough officials to clean up the properties, saying many have not been touched since late August’s Hurricane Irene.
   Liberty Street resident Bob Kaminski pointed out to Mayor Angelo Corradino and council members that a resolution was passed by the council ordering residents to clean up their properties.
   ”You folks passed a resolution months ago about cleaning up some of these properties and you are just getting around to sending out letters now? I think that is deplorable. I really do,” he said.
   Councilwoman Susan Asher told Mr. Kaminski, “Letters were sent. We are holding the mortgage companies responsible if they (the houses) have been abandoned.”
   Mr. Kaminski said he understood the resolution to be that if the residents did not clean up their properties the town was going to do something about it. Mayor Corradino explained, “We have to give them the opportunity. Once we give them the opportunity and they don’t respond, then if we clean it up, we put a lien on the property.”
   Mr. Kaminski said that in warmer weather people say the area smells like “walking through the woods on a foggy day. It is permeating out of those houses. There are other concerns. There are wildlife concerns. There is debris and other concerns.”
   Another resident who asked to be anonymous gave the Mayor a CD with video and photos of the area of Boesel Avenue.
   He urged them to look at “how high the grass is, what the houses look like and the conditions of the backyards. Look behind the house; there is nothing but garbage bags and trash from the flood. Some houses have three vehicles one, two, three, right in a row in their driveway no license plates, working on them and other ones are still there from the flood.”
   This resident invited the Mayor and council members to meet on Wednesday to walk the section of the valley to see the concerns. The resident also mentioned the neighbors of a few of these abandoned houses have been taking turns cutting the grass in the front of the houses. There are also concerns about the houses that still have water in their basements and the mosquitoes breeding in that water.
   Resident Mike Corcoran gave photos of a house with extremely high grass. Borough Attorney Francis Linnus said he would look into whether Manville has a property maintenance code; Borough Administrator Gary Garwacke said Manville did.
   According to Mr. Garwacke, there are steps that need to be followed, starting with the letters sent to homeowners.