Thursday, February 05, 2009

Brentwood Ave

(Clicking on the photo will let you download the full resolution version)

This is a picture I took the other day of a man walking his dog in front of the 1500 block of Brentwood Avenue.  The entire block (1504 - 1528 Brentwood Ave.) is owned by an LLC called "Station Place, LLC".  Baltimore City Tax Records show that they've been paying taxes of about ~$150 / year on each one of those abandoned structures since 2005 (as far back as the online records go).  That's the sort of thing that frustrates me.  Some developer is sitting on that property, waiting for the Station North Arts & Entertainment District to take off.  In the meantime, the city is stuck with rat-infested eye-sores.  Do owners of abandoned property have to pay any sort of special nuisance assessment?  Seems like there ought to be something to compel property owners to either provide real upkeep on a house or forfeit it to the city.

2 comments:

Greg Eckenrode said...

Private investors sacrificing the good of the larger community for personal profit? Sounds like good old-fashioned capitalism to me! Your implication that the city should financially penalize these fine upstanding citizens just because it's in the best interests of everyone else who lives in Baltimore sounds like dirty socialism to me.

Bill Mill said...

http://flickr.com/photos/9396421@N02/2737256369/ and http://www.flickr.com/photos/patgavin/3226182751/ ; both photographers zoomed out a bit from you.

This guy went fisheye and got close enough to block out the background: http://www.flickr.com/photos/24537273@N05/3071303193/ .