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Highlands Today

Neighbor pays taxes, cleans up abandoned lot

JASMINA MEYER, Highlands Today

Serge Fleurimond speaks about the condition of a vacant lot next to his home near the intersection of Fred Conner Street and South Delaney Avenue on Tuesday in Avon Park.

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By AIYANA BAIDA

Highlands Today

Published: October 28, 2009

AVON PARK - Calls of abandoned properties in Avon Park have flooded the city's code enforcement's office. Complaints about overgrown grass, squatters living in the abandoned homes and illegal activity on these lots have been an ongoing problem for the city.

But instead of calling it in, one resident decided to clean up his neighbor's lot and pay his taxes.

Serge Fleurimond did not want to see the abandoned lot next door go from one absent owner to the next, so for the last three years he paid back taxes on the vacant lot of his neighbor, Jose H. Gomes de Freitas.

"I end up cleaning the property every morning and mowing the lawn every three to four weeks. When I couldn't do it, I paid $40 for someone else to do it," Fleurimond said.

Fleurimond estimates that he has paid $900 in back taxes for Freitas' property and has spent hundreds of hours picking up trash and drug baggies off the lot.

"Every morning I pick up the trash because I don't want my kids to find drugs here," Fleurimond said.

At Monday's city council meeting, Fleurimond asked the city to foreclose on the property and allow him to buy it.

But the $46,866.52 lien exceeds the value of the lot.

"He is proposing that the city work something out in regards to the liens," said City Attorney Gerald T. Buhr at the meeting.

The council agreed to proceed with foreclosure proceedings on the lot, which sits between Fleurimond's home and the Church of Christ and is across the street from Aline McWhite Park.

Councilwoman Brenda Gray suggested the vacant lot be turned into a parking lot for the park.

After years of dealing with vagrants and maintaining the property, Fleurimond was outraged.

In a later interview he pointed to several other lots along Hammock Boulevard and South Carolina Avenue that could be used for parking if needed.

"I don't want a parking lot next door to me, and the church doesn't want a parking lot next door, either," Fleurimond said.

Dream home not what it seems

When Fleurimond moved to Avon Park from Delray Beach in 2005, he thought he found the perfect place to raise his kids. But within months of living in his Southside home, he noticed the lot next door attracted vagrants who used drugs and engaged in other illegal activity.

At one time the lot was owned by David Hicks, who built a basketball court on it for the kids to use, said Arnold Davis, Southside CRA board member.

With no maintenance the basketball court is unusable. Broken glass is scattered all over the court, and on the grass, drug baggies were everywhere.

"I moved my kids to my mother's home because I can't control what they pick up," Fleurimond said.

He said he has had to replace the windows of his homes over five times because vagrants throw rocks at his home. The last straw, he said, was when a rock thrown broke the window of his son's room.

Code enforcement has done all they could to reach the owner, whose only known address is in Curacao, a Dutch Caribbean island.

"It was a problem property for the city and we've constantly tried to serve and cite the owner but we can't reach him," said Capt. Donald Simmons of code enforcement.

The property was cited $250 a day for 185 days and charged for the amount it cost the city to clean up the property on several occasions.

Fleurimond bought a house in another neighborhood in Avon Park and tried to rent this one out. The only tenants that moved in, moved out after three months because they couldn't deal with the vagrants, Fleurimond said.

"They told me they couldn't live here because it wasn't safe," he said. Fleurimond maintained his property and the vacant lot for several years hoping that things would get better, but according to him, they only got worse.

The family experienced hard times when his wife lost her second job. Shortly after, their other Avon Park home was foreclosed on in 2008 and the family had to move back into their Southside home.

But Fleurimond doesn't feel safe there.

"Sometimes at night I hear gun shots as they're driving away...by the time I look out the window they're gone," he said.

Highlands Today reporter Aiyana Baida can be reached at (863)386-5855 or nbaida@highlandstoday.com

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