By BOB SHRALUKA
WZBD.com
“Waiting games” are currently under way on a couple of Decatur homes targeted by the city’s code enforcement department.
One of them, at 1034 Parkview Dr., has been a pain in the department’s backside – and raising the ire of neighbors – for some four years.
At one time the building was slated to be in the Maumee River Basin’s flood buyout plans in Decatur. Then its owner died, the place went to his three children – Reuben Soto Jr. and two sisters – and eventually it fell out of the buyout plans.
The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) got a piece of the ownership action and began ignoring all attempts at contact by the city’s building and zoning department headed by Curt Witte.
The family has no interest in retaining the structure.
Now, though, Witte told the board of works and safety at its latest meeting, final notices of pending demolition have been sent to the family and to the USDA.
So a waiting game is under way, with the home scheduled for demolition at the end of the month.
Meanwhile, a home at 728 Schirmeyer St. which was heavily damaged in a fire in October, was purchased by a Florida firm.
It is, however, on a list for a sheriff’s sale in March, Witte told the board. So “we’ll wait and see” until then to decide what to do next, he said.
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