Perhaps Mr Skakun can have a request put in to city administration to find out how many of these trailers are owned by the city and or any back taxes on any of them BEFORE the next meeting. Bring it all out in the open – transparency.

Don’t stop at just this trailer park…..

If one of the posters on this site is even partly responsible for getting this out in the open – I believe it is June Geisser – Kiddos to you!

As this is a complaint driven city – kuddos also for others whom stepped up to the plate.

My neighbour has had his house half sided for 3 years..rarely mows his lawn and parks all over his lawn.. The city should come over and see if they think it looks worse than allowable.

Iits about time the traffic of unsavoury people going to and from some of trailers is a disgrace to everyone who is trying to clean the VLA up. Iam sure if this trailer court was shut down the crime rate would drop 50% at least

I hate to say it but another place that needs to be looked into is the Connaught Inn on Victoria St. at one time it was the nicest place in P.G. to stay. When you have a attempted murder and the hit men running around a residential neighbourhood its time to step back and take a look at your business and bring it back to what it used to be and not let it turn into the old Ranch Motel. Safety in neighbourhoods should be one of the Citys top concerns.

Lol at crying cause someone hasn’t finished there siding..you ever think they can’t afford it..and I cut my grass once a year too so tough break

I wish the regional District would also take such action. It takes very little money to remove unwanted junk from ones property. I also would recommend that the District reduce fees at the Landfill to assist those that can’t afford the fees yet wish to clean up unsightly properties. For those who think rural living is a license to creat a junkyard, think again as most of us reside there for the peace and quiet.

What is the minimum acceptable standard?

City Hall should partner with Northern Health on this issue, because I swear, some trailers and homes in this city should be condemned vis-à-vis Dwellings and Buildings Regulation under The Public Health Act.

The shack just past PGI Foods on 5th Ave., on the right hand side as you drive towards Central, looks like it should be condemned. Nice to see City Hall / Mayor and Council taking the bull by the horns in tackling this issue.

I think this is a slippery slope and Council should be careful. While I don’t like to see personal junkyards in my community or neighbourhoods, I tend to think of a person’s home as their castle (no matter what kind of crap-hole I might perceive it to be) and I still see it as sacred. If it is actually posing an active threat to the properties and people around it, then yes, by all means act. However, if this is more of an aesthetic consideration, I’d say leave well enough alone.

If your solution is to impose clean-up costs on people who probably can’t afford it and eventually end up ceasing their property I’m dead set against it. This will ultimately mean more costs for taxpayers in the form of legal fees, demolition and maintenance costs. I mean do you understand the fundamental nature of this town? Is it part of your mandate to address inter-generational poverty, or simple poverty as well? This often contributes to derelict properties directly.

If there is a safety concern, you can get the proper authorities involved with troubled properties and owners who tend not to comply with bylaw officer orders, which will often include the police, who have the skills, mandate and experience in dealing with these issues. If there is no safety concerns, stay out of it. Issue your tickets in the capacity that you have and do what you need to compel payment, but don’t overstep your bounds.

If there is a safety concern and HEALTH concern , the proper authorities should be involved. Turning a blind eye to bad conditions people have live in because they are poor and have no choice , because the government has these places reserved for these situations, sometimes children are involved. Landlords need to make sure their rentals are clean and safe, for everyone involved.

@Tre Telligman. You say that you cut your lawn once a year. Short of living on an acreage, that makes you a pretty lazy person. Why are you proud of this? Generally speaking you can simply drive around town and measure a person’s worth by looking at how well they maintain their property. Assuredly, you are worth much.

I’m happy that council is doing this. We have generations of trashy people, trashy businesses, and run down properties. Clean them up or bulldoze them all.

In Criminolgy classes we were taught ” Broken Window Theory” with many other theory’s (look it up on any web domain) will you “Tre Telligman” be the first to phone the RCMP when articles in your yard go missing? and or vandalism starts to occur in your neighbourhood ? Because one person does not have self motivation or work ethic that includes pride.. Others should not suffer ..

If you would move and live in the bush you would not have to cut any lawn at all! Just a hint.

Tre.. Yeah must be low on funds.. Just bought two boats and another car.. Guessing you are just a ignorant neighbour.

I used to own a nice house on tamarack street. I kept my lawn and trees nice and my yard was very nice.
I had many neighbors that kept junk in their yards and I made written complaints to the city bylaw office. They had no teeth and over a few years, I accepted the fact that the city of prince George did not care for its city.
I decided to sell my property, it took a while to sell but I am glad the transaction went through. The druggies and slobs can have the neighborhood.
I am reluctant to invest my money in this city mostly because of my past history with bylaw services.

I do hope the city gets tough on these lazy people. Maybe one day I will invest my money here again but not until there is some firm bylaws protecting the beauty of Prince George properties.

why is it that poor people tend to have lots and lots of junk in their yards??

I never understood this.

The real issue is that now we are now focused on derelict properties which has become the latest buzz in the City. A good spin by the local politicos to take away from the real issues before them …. a crumbling infrastructure and downtown ….. this includes the sidewalks, roadways, lack of maintenance of city properties …. the list can go on. Now they have managed to shift the focus at least for now onto a few properties to avoid a much bigger issue ….. as for the comments from those with the nose high in the air, if it were not for the low mortgage rates many now living above their means may one day welcome the run down trailer with the rusted out car in the driveway!

I agree with some of sine nominee’s comments.

This city better tread very carefully with these matters.

Has anyone gone around to the The city of Prince George properties? The Landsdown Road Public Works Storage yard and the old buildings/lots on the other side of George Street come to mind. They are both disgraceful.

The city has had complaints over 5 years coming from various residents on a piece of agriculture land by Cycle north out west and this property is a total mess. It is not being used as agriculture, there are a bunch of old containers rotting away just to name a few. Hate to see what has gone in to the creek there over the years.

How many complaints does it take this city to take action????

The city owns some of the trailers in these trailer parks due to some of the individual trailer owners not paying their city taxes. The city cannot even monitor itself and may be the biggest culprit.

Why are these trailers left to the park owners to deal with? The city needs to take responsibility of what they own? So why has the city not cleaned up their own mess – in more ways than one…?

People should be asking why the administrators of By Laws, Planning, Building Inspectors, Waste Management, Licencing, Property Taxation,-or any department at the City of Prince George, or Northern Health, or the Residential Tenancy Branch, anybody with any authority in any department why they have not looked into the problems before this?

I wonder if someone else wants this property?

Relocating these tenants would be a nightmare.

The City of Prince George and the Health Dept have obviously made no attempts to clean up this park. How many junkers belong/ed to the city and even they do not want them for the unpaid taxes due. The property owner is left with the garbage sitting on lots the park owners collects NO RENT for?

One councillor mentioned not long ago in regards to low income housing – how this city needs low income housing such as these trailer parks.

Maybe she should be asking herself if she would live in some of these trailers? I do feel sorry for some of these people that are really trying to keep their head above water. Come to think of it in the long run some of these trailer’s rent are being paid by your tax dollars one way or another. How many renters are actually on welfare?

Society needs to rethink..

J T , in the hopes that one day it will turn into gold. I have neighbours like that.

joey tomatoe asked “why is it that poor people tend to have lots and lots of junk in their yards??”

I’m not saying this is the only reason but often a “poor family” will move into a rental to find that the previous tenants have left a bunch of broken furniture, bags of trash and other crap behind. The options for the new tenants are to either move in on top of the trash or move it out into the yard or driveway. With no money to transport the junk to the transfer station nor to pay for the fees there are not many options left.
A church I used to belong to had a “dumpster day” in the VLA. We had a large dumpster (the biggest possible) and let people know that they could get rid of the junk for free. People were amazingly responsive and carried their junk for blocks so they could get rid of it. We ended up filling two dumpsters by the end of the day. To be honest, some people didn’t give a damn about their crappy looking yards but obviously many did.

One of the better pro-active comments on this discussion thread Some-Body. Perhaps the City, and Church Groups, could jointly fund and sponser “dumpster day” on an annual basis and expand it beyond the VLA?

I wish the regional district would go pick up all the thousands of small garbage dumps that litter the city and the back roads.

Probably spending his time on the computer or TV like a teenager.

Wow the city sure has lots of balls going after ownerless trailers and the sorts …… Lol

How about taking a drive through west gate and looking at the conditions at some of the properties there? Uncut lawns, rv’s haves taken up residence on the roads …looks disgusting.

I live on a residential street that has a 35 year old housing stock on it.

Some park their motor homes on the street for the summer.

Some have 3, 4, 5 vehicles, some of which are parked on the street, others on the lawn because the driveway is not large enough.

There is even one who has ATVs parked in the backyard. Occasionally the back gate leading to the park adjacent to the house opens up and a young kid will ride the ATV back and forth along the park for 15 to 30 minutes.

Some have immaculate front yards, and some not quite as immaculate as some people obsessed with golf course quality lawns would like to see everywhere.

The street itself has subsided in one part over the almost 4 decades and the low point is no longer at a catch basin, so every time it rains the gutter has puddle that spans two property frontages.

A corner catchbasin was not cleared of debris from the winter when they did the once a year street sweeping, so the water percolates very slowly through the drain leaving a puddle which spans a third of the width of the street until it finally drains down after the rain stops, a process which takes half the day.

The expansion cracks in the pavement have not been cleaned out for some years and filled with asphalt. On crack is about 3cm wide with weeds having found a place to grow, despite the occasional car driving over. Plantain, dandelions, and other weeds have also found a home in the joint between the edge of the concrete gutter/rollover curb and the asphalt surface of the road.

Then, of course, we have those very nice looking pavers on arterial roads with medians. Nice until weeds start growing in the joints. Those designs are all heavy on maintenance requirements.

Parks as well. The parks in our area used to be mowed once a week. This year I noticed more like a 2 or three week cycle giving dandelions time to go to seed and ending up with these tall, crooked stalks before the mowing crew came along.

A picture along the park boundary bordered by a multitude of painted, unpainted, straight as well as leaning and some falling over fences is also a sight to behold. Looks like parts of the Russian FarEast.

It is not only some personal properties which are not pleasing to some people’s eyes. It is City roads, sidewalks, ditches, parks, etc. as well.

The City can increase taxes to take care of its part of the “problem”. Better still, they can also run operations more effectively and efficiently and not depend on a complaint-driven maintenance program.

The best quality control monitoring one can get is from the many City employees and Councillors who drive around the city as they work as well as when they are not working. Give them an education in what well maintained conditions should look like and provide them with a handy tool to report those conditions which simply do not meet those conditions. They are the best source of quality controllers. They get paid to take care of the City.

Have a free dumpster day in neighborhoods and maybe there would be a big voluntary cleanup. For organization dumpsters could be placed in different neighbourhoods on different days over the spring. Attach some trendy name and it would be a sure winner.

250news.com/2013/09/05/prolific-property-program-makes-another-arrest

That 250 article is almost 2 years old. Police acting with the City at the time. How has that program done? Is it still in effect? How does it relate to the current program?

As with IPG programs, the City, RCMP, Fire Department, etc. also rarely reports back to the community, especially when programs are shut down because it has been successful and has done its job, or because it has failed or has no funds available to continue.

Sometimes lots of hype at the start, little baseline data and comparative analysis and reporting back to the community during and at the end of a program.