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We live in a small renovated house in an older rising or gentrifying but funky area of our city. In general the area is a patchwork of small bungalows in good condition or being remodeled, newer apartment buildings and older ones in decent repair with some exceptions and mostly interesting small businesses.
Next door is what I call a nuisance apartment, owned by a slumlord that apparently specializes in collecting rents but does nothing for the properties. What I can find out about him is very little as he is shielded by cell phone numbers, PO boxes and property managers that also can't be traced and won't return phone calls. I went through the city tax rolls and he has 4 pages under his name alone, (several more under LLCs) properties in various stages of disrepair, like our neighborhood building. When I Googled his name I found that he was once a real estate agent but had his license revoked in 2006 for illegal dealings. This is the character that I'm dealing with.
Anyway on to my problem: We have endured over the years assaults on our property from the tenants in that building. Broken kicked in fence boards, daily thrown in trash, broken glass and bottles, once a broken windshield that went to pieces so badly that we had to use a shop vac to clean it up, pools of poured out paint that seeped under our fence and had to be dug up, beer cans, cigarette butts, one starting a small fire that self extinguished in the mulch of our garden bed.
This building due to disrepair has attracted a new even lower class of residents if that's possible. Old mattresses are piled up in the back corner of the property near our fence and that area smells of excrement. Loud parties, fights, drunken shouting at all hours of the day and night. The place gets visited by the police regularly. I and other neighbors have called code enforcement multiple times, particularly about their dumpster which overflowed onto the sidewalk with regularity.
So last night we hear two loud bangs at about 2 am. We looked around but couldn't figure out what had made the noise. This morning we discovered two mostly filled beer cans laying on top of our glass greenhouse and it's a miracle that they didn't break through but some minor damage was done to the frame. We have been living in dread of the inevitable object that gets thrown through the glass from their rooftop where folks congregate to drink.
I've had enough. I can't get anywhere with the owners. The city only leans on them enough for them to straighten up for a very short time to get the code violation cleared and then it reverts to even worse conditions. The only time that there was any attempt to clean up was a couple of years ago when their insurance company threatened to cancel them, (according to the two guys loading garbage) but that effort lasted all of a few months, probably to clear re-inspection.
I need help, suggestions, experience to deal with this issue.
God help me, I've thought of that but would never follow through lest there be pets, invalids or children that could be harmed...otherwise I'd probably be doing the neighborhood a favor.
Seriously though it's a mess, both the place and the situation. Surely someone has dealt with something similar?
Does the city and/or county have a housing department? Zoning?
The city only leans on them enough for them to straighten up for a very short time to get the code violation cleared and then it reverts to even worse conditions.
They aren't afraid of code violations or the city enforcers. I am documenting now. I'll probably have to take it to civil ourt which is going to cost me. I was hoping for another method....
Try the Health Department. Call the police and file a report on every kind of violation or nuisance that makes some degree of sense.
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