by Jody Spear and Kelly Meyer –
MASON CITY – The Mason City Police were inspecting the flood houses in the area of 6th Street NE and North VanBuren, Thursday morning.
A report from one of remaining residents in the area informed the officers that the doors were open on several of the abandoned homes.
“As far as anything being stolen, anything of value has been taken long ago,” said one of the officers. “We don’t know which ones are up for demolition or which ones have been bought and will be moved, so we have them on our regular routes to keep on eye on them. These houses have been here quite awhile, we don’t really know what the future holds for this area.”
Another officer said, “We’ve asked the people that are still here to keep on eye on any suspicious activity and they do a good job. We get called maybe two or three times a week to check out something.”
Bringing up the idea of maybe some people were cold and just needed a place to sleep got the response of, “Yep, that could be.”
City officials have reported that homeless people and children have been entering the homes for years; that has been an on-going concern.
The city is still moving to have many of the 2008 flood homes removed, but federal red tape has slowed the process.
