Stricter rules: It’s time to get tough about condemned properties

No more fooling around.

In about two months, the damaged Days Inn will have been standing in disarray for nearly a year.

And while there might be some reason to excuse the delay, there is no more time left — and there’s a lesson to be learned from this experience.

That hotel damage is a serious eyesore, at a time when many out-of-towners will be speeding through Wayne County.

Why would we have allowed a company to leave a structure like this standing for so long, knowing that it was such a blight, such an eyesore?

The answer might be that there aren’t rules in place to give officials the power to speed the process.

All you have to do is look around the city to see that there is still a significant problem with buildings, houses that have no business standing.

Perhaps this should be a clue to city officials to get off the mark and to come up with much stricter rules for dealing with properties that are disintegrating and are a blight on this community.

No more talk. No more negotiating. No more waiting. The company that owns the Days Inn property has had long enough to resolve this problem.

It is time for city officials to get tough about the structure coming down — and mean it.

Right now.

Published in Editorials on June 5, 2008 10:52 AM