Kewanee’s three trailer parks are in deplorable condition.
Abandoned trailers are in still in place among inhabited ones. Weeds and tall grass have taken over in some areas. Some residents claim they have seen rats, and recently, uncollected garbage was overflowing from collection bins.
Shouldn’t the city do something about it?
“We’re trying to,” said Keith Edwards, the city’s building, zoning and community development director.
City enforcement efforts made a dent in the problem earlier this year when Edwards went to court and got condemnation orders for 13 trailers in the former Reecy’s trailer part on West Sixth Street.
That project also included demolishing an old building and clearing debris from the site.
The problem, Edwards said, is to determine exactly who owns the Reecy’s park on West Sixth, the former Reecy’s East facility on Lake Street and what was once known as Southwind Mobile Estates on Cole Street.
There are still some occupied trailers in all three of the parks. There have been complaints about the lack of trash pickup and the uncut weeds and grass.
At least two owners have been involved in the trailer parks in the last couple of years. Edwards said those owners had pledged to maintain the parks by repairing infrastructure, clearing fallen trees and so on.
But the work wasn’t done. “It just got kicked down the road,” Edwards said.
The most recent owners, he said, “turned it back to the bank.”
Apparently the trailer parks are in receivership now, and the Nick M. Shapiro Real Estate Group in West Bloomfield, Mich., is in charge of restoration of the sites.
Edwards said Waste Management was contracted to pick up the garbage, and the Shapiro firm is hiring a landscaping firm from Silvis to work on clearing out trees and brush and cutting the weeds.
He said he checked with the Silvis company and confirmed that they’re scheduled to begin work here later this month.
The Kewanee Voice has reached out to the Shapiro firm for comment but hasn’t received any response.
