MARION, Ind. –(Fox 59) Folks living at Deerwood Mobile Home Park are pleading for their neighborhood to be saved. Resident Andrea Jones and her neighbors were told on Thursday they have 15 days to leave the property.
The news comes after the Grant County Health Department posted signs on the doors.
Vacant homes read “Danger Keep Out.” Places where people live have been deemed “Unfit for Human Habitation.”
The signs are signed by Grant County Health Officer Dr. William David Moore.
“There have been problems with the cleanliness of it, the safety of it, and maybe some questions of water. With the health department our issues have to deal with the sewage that’s there and the proper and safe disposal of it,” Moore said.
Dr. Moore said for at least three years, the local and state health departments have been working with the owners of Deerwood Mobile Home Park to get a sewage problem fixed.
“There’s only one pump there and it’s been there for a long time. It doesn’t work much of the time apparently because of the amount of sewage in it causes it to get clogged,” Moore said.
Dr. Moore said earlier this week the property owners called and said they couldn’t afford to fix the problem and didn’t plan to do so, which is why the health department says the place is uninhabitable.
“It was told everything was okay that we just had to wait for state to come out here,” Jones said.
Everyone we spoke with didn’t know there was an issue. They must now find a new home or a place to move their trailer.
“This thing here, this final blow came out of blue sky for me, but we’ve been having problems out here with sewage for several years,” Deerwood Mobile Home Park resident Woodrow Davies said.
“There’s no place to go in 15 days. That’s less than 2 weeks now,” Jones said.
The Grant County Health Department says they hate forcing people out of their home, but they had to for safety reasons.
The property owners say they’re saddened by what happened.
They said they didn’t have the money to fix the sewage problems because some tenants haven’t paid rent in months.