Western Courier

What I find interesting is that the owner of this property has given a couple different stories for what his "plans" were for the property had he been able to finish restoration. He was also renting out rooms, he said this himself, before he started restoring it...which by zoning code was illegal.

All that aside however, it is not the city's job to secure someone's investment or financial state due to that person's decisions. Though it is a tragedy what happened to this historical home and I do sympathize with the financial bind this tragedy has put the owner in, it isn't the city's fault that the owner chose not to insure it for more than his property inside. In fact, that's a pretty stupid decision. We have our home insured for more than its face value...we have it insured for the cost of replacement in today's market as well as the contents insured. It is a very bad business decision no matter what he planned to do with the property to not have it insured adequately and very short sighted to not have foreseen the financial consequences if something were to occur. If you don't have the money to adequately insure an investment, you probably shouldn't go into it in the first place. Not having adequate insurance along with the different stories the owner has given about his plans for the property make me very suspicious that he didn't really have any plans to live there himself and was going to wait to try to rezone it later...or he was planning on renting it illegally once he had finished renovating it as I know for a fact some property owners have done.

I'll be quite blunt here also..I have lived only a few houses down from the property for three years and in all that time he was supposedly working on restoring it but I don't remembering seeing any work being done or anyone at the property hardly at all. I only remember a couple of times in that three years even seeing a light on or any other sign of anyone being or having been in the property. It doesn't, or at least shouldn't take, three years to renovate a property. If it does, you didn't have the capital necessary in the first place to do it and shouldn't have taken it on. It sounds to me like the owner got in above his head. An argument that a WIU student made when speaking in support of the rezoning was that a break in happened the night before the fire....if someone had been actually living in the property, it's much more unlikely such a thing would have occurred. The property being left to stand there idle and empty for so long was nothing but a calling card for trouble. I haven't heard anything yet on the official cause for the fire, but I'd put my money on it being set by someone either intentionally or accidentally...empty houses are a target for this kind of thing even in neighborhoods not near campus and in neighborhoods in cities without a college or university.

Bottom line is, and I know this may sound harsh, but the consequences for the owner of this property after the fire (though he probably had nothing to do with that event) are his own making due to bad investment decisions and just plain bad decisions period. Trying to guilt trip the council into rezoning it to save his financial butt at the expense of the neighborhood after making unwise choices(and yes there are quite a few non-rentals surrounding it and within a few yards walk of it, mine included) is just not a good call and obviously the council and citizens weren't buying it, as well they shouldn't have.

My proposal is that the comprehensive plan along with keeping this area R-2 single family and slowly converting those current rentals that were grandfathered in back to single family as they come up for sale in the future, calls for this area to have such things as a community garden or neighborhood park. I think it would be wonderful if the city or some other collective entity could buy the property from the owner and set one of these two things up on it if it can't be sold for a single family home site. A nice corner park with a couple picnic tables and some playground equipment within half a block's walk would be very nice for my family and the others that have children on the block and those that may come in the future and could possibly be named after the former owners before the current one that cared for the property and lived there and raised their family there for 50 years.

For those that want to argue "oh but there are so many other rentals there on Pierce"...the comprehensive plan for Macomb, which the city spent quite a pretty penny to have drawn up, calls for this area to eventually be revitalized as single family again. That can't happen if the trend of putting up or converting houses and rezoning into more and more rentals is allowed to continue. The argument that a WIU student used at the meeting that since there is already vandalism and disruptions going on they should rezone it as a rental is ludicrous. Obviously that observation that there are problems, which is true, should be a wake up call to the city that more of a police presence and surveillance is sorely needed (the comprehensive plan even states that lack of police presence is definitely felt in this area) in order to help make this a more welcoming area for families to settle back into. To just say because there are problems, "screw it...let's just build more rentals because of the problems" is just waving the white flag to the immature and reckless students that live in or traverse through that area...it would be like trying to put out a fire by pouring a can of gasoline on it. If there are problems there, adding higher density rentals is NOT going to help...it will only make it WORSE. And also...how is that fair to those students that rent that are responsible and here to get an education if they have to put up with that sort of thing too or pay fines for damages done by fellow student vandals? What happens is that those responsible students that want a good environment for studying and living won't move into any rentals put on that site or near it and then the "problem" students move in who don't care because they are part of the problem themselves.

I applaud the planning and zoning commission and the committee that voted this rezoning down for finally taking a stand and taking the first step towards reclaiming these neighborhoods and doing what is right by the long time citizens who live here, raise their families here, and wish to continue to stand up against the deterioration of this section of the city that has been spreading like a cancer for too long.

Underinsuring your property is stupid beyond comprehension.