Nearly two years after fire, Boone County property left in ruins sparks safety concerns
COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)
A Boone County property that burned down nearly two years ago still hasn’t been cleaned up, which has drawn the ire of residents.
The house -- located in the 400 block of Hackberry Boulevard -- burned down in the early morning of Jan. 28, 2022. The rubble has set there since.
“We go out there and this thing is fully involved. Two-story house fire is through the roof. There is nothing we are going to save,” Assistant Fire Chief Gale Blomenkamp told ABC 17 News. “We called in Columbia Fire Department and they came in with their aerial device.”
The fire started near the front of the house but the cause is still not known, according to Blomenkamp.
Boone County Fire says that the homeowner told them she was living in the house with her daughter and daughter's husband. But, records show that she has not had running water in nine years.
Neighbors claim the owners were using the house for storage. Boone County Fire added that the home was insured but it is unclear what was done with the insurance money.
A neighbor told ABC 17 News that she feels unsafe in her own home due to the burned-out building that sits across from her backyard. She claims that squatters break into the sheds that sit in the backyard of the burned-down building.
She also claims that people will dig through the rubble in the middle of the night and that she was woken up on several occasions.
Other neighbors expressed safety concerns.
“It’s slowly just kind of falling in on itself, and possibly a health hazard, because there are a lot of kids who play on the street in front of it,” Chris Jennings, a nearby resident, said. “It needs to be torn down, or raised; and the rubble -- or what’s left of it -- hauled away.”
But, under section 116 of Boone County’s building code, the county has the jurisdiction to force a property to be cleaned up, if it is deemed an unsafe structure. Under the code, the county can ask the homeowner to clean up the house and force restitution with tax billings if it is not cleaned up.
Boone County Commissioner Janet Thompson has been working with the Boone County health department to try and get the rubble cleared. She told ABC 17 News that because the home is so badly damaged, it cannot legally be considered a structure.
The county is now working on a nuisance abatement on the property, since the condition of the land is considered a nuisance to neighbors. Thompson added that the process has taken a long time because Boone County is a non-charter county, which “limits the tools in its toolbox.”
Thompson is optimistic that a nuisance abatement could be finalized soon.
