Fourth Ward tour showcases successes, work that remains
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Jeremy Jorgenson, a Probation and Parole Agent looks on at a house deemed by neighbors in the area as a "problem home". Jorgenson is responsible for this Fourth Ward and many of these "problem homes" are all too familiar to police.
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Residents, city council members and Janesville police walk past a pile of trash during a tour of the city’s Fourth Ward neighborhood Tuesday. While a number of improvements were pointed out on the tour, Fourth Ward residents say much remains to be done.
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Members of the community walk with Janesville Police Officers past a home that, though not listed as a problem home by neighbors, is indicative of the type of disrepair some homes in the area have fallen into.
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David Moore
JANESVILLE — The tour through the Fourth Ward early Tuesday evening was full of contrasts.
A terrace full of dog feces and a front porch fronted by pretty potted flowers. Windows covered with plywood and exquisitely renovated homes. A pile of garbage and neatly kept lawns.
Pockets of good and pockets of bad.
Resident Burdette Erickson was the guide, pointing out the successes but also the work that remains to be done in his neighborhood.
About 20 residents—some from other neighborhoods—and city staff, council members and probation officers tagged along. The crowd also included Police Chief Dave Moore and other police officers.
Erickson first spoke to those assembled on vacant property next to his High Street home. He explained that the former owner recently tore the home down and donated the land to the nearby Janesville Woman's Club rather than selling it and running the risk of it becoming rental property.
Erickson talked of landlords who rent irresponsibly or don't maintain their properties, warning they were being watched.
"We will not remain silent any longer about what landlords and tenants do to us," Erickson said.
Some residents can't use their front porches because of fighting and drinking, he said. Tenants urinate in front of children. Some residents are embarrassed to have company over, or their relatives don't want to visit them. Drug deals block sidewalks and driveways. The stench of dog feces is terrible in at least one area.
"That's what we live with," Erickson said. Tenants can destroy the quality of life.
But tenants come and go like flies, he said, and landlords always seem to find others who can find even more creative ways to disrupt neighbors' lives.
Threatening landlords with exposure is the neighbors' weapon, Erickson said, adding he wanted those on the walk to see the tenants who cause them so much trouble.
Erickson distributed fliers with a list of trouble addresses, and Moore said the eight officers there Tuesday have the fliers now.
"Tomorrow, 104 (officers) will have it," Moore said.
Officers will meet with each of the landlords, Moore said. Recently, the city issued a landlord the most violations ever under its chronic nuisance ordinance.
Artists Susan Hunt-Wulkowicz and her mother, Jan Hunt, live at the corner of Academy and Holmes streets and were on the tour. They love the older homes and the diversity of the Fourth Ward.
The city needs affordable housing, Hunt-Wulkowicz said. But landlords should rent more responsibly.
Hunt-Wulkowicz said the women find themselves constantly explaining to people who visit their gallery that they should not be surprised by the mix of housing. And last summer, the women didn't sit out on their porch because the renters across the street threw nightly drunken parties. Drugs were involved, as well, they said.
This year, the building is vacant, and they once again feel comfortable sitting outside.
Resident Tom Lemmer passed a home on Cherry Street and served up its story.
It is now vacant, but the recent tenants were evicted and left their stuff behind. The landlord is in jail.
Liz Anderson recently moved to South Jackson Street into a lovely restored home owned by a great landlord. She had heard good things about what was going on in the Fourth Ward and wanted to be part of it, she said. Anderson, too, likes homes with character and the neighborhood's diversity.
But she's had to call the police a half-dozen times on the people across the street, she said.
Maricela Del Camino has four kids and she, too, said she is concerned about the environment.
Erickson thanked the city staff members assembled for the homes they have rehabilitated and those they have torn down. On one vacant lot, though, resident Ilah Hartung started picking up trash and ran out of hands.
"I guess I can't pick everything up," she said, almost apologetically.
Erickson credited police officers and city staff for recent successes. There was a time when groups of people roamed the streets on summer nights, neighbors were afraid to go outside and drug deals were more blatant.
The police couldn't have done it without the neighbors, Moore said.
"If we all work together, collectively, we can make change," Moore said. The Fourth Ward and nearby Look West neighborhoods cannot be lost to crime and must be kept safe because they reflect on the entire city.
Probation officers present handed out their cards.
"If you ever have questions about supervision, call us," one said.
"You officers, we cannot tell you enough how well you are doing your job," Erickson told those dressed in blue.
"Amen," a resident shouted.
Jun 29, 2012 at 4:05 p.m.
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For the record, I'm very impressed with how well preserved and maintained many of the homes are in the Fourth Ward.
Jun 29, 2012 at 12:06 p.m.
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Marcia Nelesen - Thank you very much for such a wonderful article about our neighborhood :o)
Jun 29, 2012 at 9:17 a.m.
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What?!
Jun 29, 2012 at 9:02 a.m.
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I think I split an infinitive, or something.
*****
No, there is no such evidence. Much to the consternation of the anti-evolutionist believers in the bible-god.
But it's the vastness of the universe and the number of galaxies, solar systems, and planets and the stretch of time that suggest the possibility of life. But it is that very vastness of space and the speed limit of the speed of light that makes it unlikely that intelligent life will know about, or especially have close contact with, other intelligent life.
Jun 29, 2012 at 8:39 a.m.
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showcases3rd person singular present, plural of show·case
Noun:
A glass case used for displaying articles in a store or museum.
Verb:
Exhibit; display.
More info »Merriam-Webster - The Free Dictionary
It's also a verb.
Jun 29, 2012 at 8:36 a.m.
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showcases
Jun 29, 2012 at 8:26 a.m.
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oldvet, your explanation justifies the use of the word "showcase" in the story.
Jun 29, 2012 at 7:24 a.m.
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ibroofer...The use of showcases here here is INCORRECT. "Showcases" IS a noun: IE; objects.
Gazettefan. Yes I have heard of all three but its use here is still incorrect. A metaphor is a literary figure of speech that describes a subject by asserting that it is, on some point of comparison, the same as another otherwise unrelated object. (note the word "object")
Jun 28, 2012 at 11:38 p.m.
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Frogger - This walk was by invitation. I can't speak for the whole 4th ward but we bought our house in 1997 and the part that we live in is so much better today than it was back then. In 1997 we pretty much stayed in the house because of what was going on in the neighborhood but now we are outside playing and talking with our neighbors who are also outside enjoying our great neighborhood. The 4th ward is not for everybody, you have to be ready to fight back and not give up, we are very lucky to have Burdette Erickson showing us how to go about fixing things and the BEST police force that handles things for us.
Jun 28, 2012 at 4:35 p.m.
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Hey, thanks for telling us about this tour AFTER the fact.
"Hunt-Wulkowicz said the women find themselves constantly explaining to people who visit their gallery that they should not be surprised by the mix of housing. And last summer, the women didn't sit out on their porch because the renters across the street threw nightly drunken parties. Drugs were involved, as well, they said."
Then you call the police EVERY NIGHT if you have too.
I am glad some are willing to take the chance to more her and improve but I looked here for a home in 1994 and was concerned about resale because I knew I wasn't going to live in my first house forever and then"it was improving".
Until they get rid of the trash it will never be fixed.
Jun 28, 2012 at 2:57 p.m.
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oldvet, have you ever heard of a metaphor, simile, or analogy? Or, figurative speech?
Jun 28, 2012 at 8:32 a.m.
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oldvet, the term showcases was used correctly:
tr.v. show·cased, show·cas·ing, show·cas·es
To display prominently, especially to advantage.
Jun 28, 2012 at 8:11 a.m.
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KTM - Yes, he is VERY devoted to our neighborhood :o)
Jun 28, 2012 at 8:10 a.m.
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Gmaof3 - You ask how the Buy, Rehab, Resell program is working in the 4th ward? Well it is working GREAT!! We have some homes that were beyond repair that have been taken down and now there is nice green space instead of houses that are falling down. We have a lot that is going to get a brand new house on it soon. We are loving the program.
Jun 28, 2012 at 7:15 a.m.
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"Fourth Ward tour showcases successes, work that remains"
A showcase is an object, not something that one does or that occurs.
Frank Schultz, where are you?
Jun 27, 2012 at 10:25 p.m.
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doc0430, the Buy Sell Rehab program was funded with a federal Community Development Block Grant. The point of the program is to eliminate blighted properties by repairing or razing them, and selling those that remain to qualified single-occupancy families. The program is not intended to turn a profit. I'm sorry if you don't like it, but most government programs involve spending money, and this is actually a program where some of that spent money comes back and can be recycled. When is the last time the street in front of your house returned money to city coffers?
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BigJbias does have a point. There is a mutual dependency between bad renters and bad landlords. Some of these landlords don't seem to care that they are renting to people who will stop paying, bug out, and leave the apartment a horrific mess. (There are tax advantages, in fact, to having your rental property bottom line be a paper loss.) Sadly, these landlords are the ones who have the potential to control the outcome of an entire block of homes by bringing one down to slumlord level, and the remaining residents, whether they are owner-occupied, good renters, or even other landlords, have no real recourse except diligently reporting criminal and nuisance behavior, something that does not have a good track record of achieving results quickly; even when the bad tenants almost inevitably move out, the property has often seen a significant drop in appearance and quality and cannot be expected to suddenly, miraculously attract better tenants.
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The point we keep coming back to is that while we don't like the bad tenants, it's the bad landlords who have the power to change things. Only fear of exposure seems to motivate some of them; in a few cases it takes more than one meeting with the chief of police to see credible results. If they can expect that one day their property might be on the front page of the Gazette, maybe they'll realize, finally, that they have some responsibility to the community.
Jun 27, 2012 at 10:08 p.m.
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gmaof3, I have lived next to both problem homes pictured in the article, and I am convinced that the logic behind renting to people with bad references and police records is to cover the property owners guilt. The landlord doesn't turn in the renter for illegal activity or evict them for being a nuisance, and the renter doesn't complain about the bad plumbing or code issues.
Jun 27, 2012 at 9:28 p.m.
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Mr. Erickson, I remember having him as a teacher. Definitley one of the good one's. Even back then he was working on the 4th ward. he is Definitley devoted to it!
Jun 27, 2012 at 9:27 p.m.
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gmaof3 you asked about the "Buy, Rehab, and Resell" program the city of Janesville started, here's an excerpt from yesterdays story on Monday nights Janesville Council meeting, it was at the very end of the story and unfortunately comments on the story when I last read them were all focused on Janesville not entering into the Going Green(er)Green Tier Program at this time, here is what they reported on the BRR Program you asked about;
The Janesville City Council on Monday:
-- Unanimously voted to sell for $73,000 a home the city bought and repaired at a cost of $158,000. The sale is part of the city's effort to improve inner-city neighborhoods.
With buy and sell deal like this, it's no wonder the city is so far in debt! Spend $158,000 and sold it for $73,000??? Something sure doesn't sound right there, maybe someone needs to explain economics to them, after all real estate went up last year, just look at your property tax bill!
And here is the link to the story because as I've learned in the past, that when I post something that was fact or reported as fact, someone will come along and challenge that.
http://gazettextra.com/news/2012/jun/26/...
Jun 27, 2012 at 5:05 p.m.
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I simply do not understand the logic behind renting to people with crappy references, or someone that has a police record. (I'm not talking about petty theft, you know what I mean...) This neighborhood has been a violent tinder box for decades. Nothing seems to get better for long.
Years ago, "it was the police department's fault", then the economy, now slumlords.
In February 2009, the city had a program called, "Buy, Rehab, Resell". So how's THAT going for the 4th ward?
Same ideas, just call it something else.
Same attempts, different day...
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