Sheldon, Iowa — Demolition began Monday morning at 1023 Garfield Avenue in Sheldon. For the past several months that property has been the subject of a nuisance complaint brought by the City of Sheldon.
Sheldon City Manager Sam Kooiker tells us about the property.
(As above) “The property had been owned by a gentleman who passed away several years ago, and it had been abandoned. The house is actually an old box car, there used to be railroad tracks that ran behind there. And the box car had been converted to a home many years ago, and we believe it’s been there since at 1920. The City has invested a significant amount already in cleaning up the property. We spent approximately four thousand dollars removing old cottonwood trees, and several thousand dollars on legal fees. We have now found a new, responsible owner, who’s cleaning it up, Kerwin Sterler, Kerwin and Kathy. We’re very happy about what they’re going to do, they’re planning to put in a single family dwelling on the site.”
Kooiker says there are two types of nuisance properties, with the 1023 Garfield Avenue property being the most complicated type.
(As above) “There’s two types of nuisance properties; there’s nuisance properties where someone has walked away from it, and then there’s nuisance properties where someone has passed away. When you have a nuisance property where someone has passed away it’s much more complicated when you have a potential estate involved. Thankfully with the 1023 Garfield property, the family lives over by Maurice and Ireton, and they have been extremely cooperative. If it wasn’t for how cooperative they’ve been we would still be dealing with the issue.”
He says the Sterlers’ plan for the Garfield Avenue Property includes moving an existing single-family dwelling onto the property from another location. Which, he says, will requite a hearing before the Board of Adjustment.
(As above) “The proposal from the Sterlers is to take a house from somewhere else and put it at 1023 Garfield, and that’s why that’s moving forward right now. That also requires a hearing, but that’s in front of the Board of Adjustment, to do what’s called relocated residential. When you move house to an established neighborhood you need to have a hearing in front of a Board of Adjustment, so I’m already working with the Sterlers on that.”
The City has also been working with Kerwin and Kathy Sterler on their proposal to acquire the former Sunset Motel property on South 2nd Avenue, to abate that nuisance property. Kooiker says that’s taking a little longer to complete because the property will have to be rezoned, as well as the ownership of the property being complicated by the fact that one of the heirs to the property lives in the Philippines.
