Melissa Hill: My, What Nice Tomato Plants You Have! Now Stay The (Expletive) Out Of Ward 3 Politics...

God Bless The Fourth Precinct 

Playing the old "reluctant political candidate" tune like a rummage sale guitar with one string, St. Anthony East resident Melissa Hill recently started a Facebook group to talk about the fact that, oh, she's so reluctant to do so, but some friends are saying she should run against Diane Hofstede in Ward 3.



Here's what Hill has to say about herself on Facebook...





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Hi,



I'm Melissa Hill. I'm a current resident of NE Minneapolis (St. Anthony East) and previously lived for 3 years in the McKinley neighborhood in North Minneapolis so I've spent a good portion of 8 years in Ward 3. During this time, I've seen the city suffer under the mis-mangement of the current council and mayor.



In the past few months, I've had numerous people come up to me and ask me to run for Ward 3 City Council in Minneapolis. The current incumbent is very unresponsive and appears to be more worried about couches on porches than an out-of-control police department.



The problem is that I don't care much for politics so I'm a very reluctant candidate. However, I also see how badly run the city has been so I feel it may be worth giving up a summer to try to do something about it.



This group is open to anyone, even those not in Ward 3 or Minneapolis.

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To which I respond: Oh, thank you Melissa (sarcasm font) for trying to save me from "out of control" cops. Indeed, as I walk amid the constant open air drug dealing at Hawthorn (sic) Crossings strip mall on West Broadway, or the squalor that accumulates at the edge of Merwin's Liquor on the "butt fence," I think to myself, "I hope some out of control cop doesn't jump out of a squad car and just start whapping me with his nightstick in an oh-so-nonconsensual way."



Melissa, you said like four lines of text about your campaign, but you had to take a shot at the police. That tells me all I need to know about you, plus the picture of you with a BULLHORN on Facebook. The fact you no longer live in McKinley where you can make a difference, but have moved to the paradise which is St. Anthony East tells me even more. (That's a shot at YOU, Melissa, not St. Anthony. What I wouldn't give for Hawthorne to be more like St. Anthony or even, for that matter, even Marcy-Holmes with its free range collegiate couches)



The criticisms you make of "the current incumbent" do strike a cord with me, however. I've found her unresponsive at times, too, and I thought the couch thing was petty and stupid. My biggest beef with the city, however, is that citizens can't look up properties by name of property owner on the search function of the City's property website, a flaw which left us in the Hawthorne Neighborhood SEVEN MONTHS BEHIND on dealing with a bad actor whose property featured crack and prostitution and yet "the current incumbent" sits right across from me at a meeting and she doesn't GET THAT.



But you, Melissa, have nothing to say about whores and drug dealers. No, you reserve your politically correct venom for the BRAVE COPS who are protecting us up here in the Fourth Precinct while you lounge around in St. Anthony East, cooing about your tomatoes, while they protect you in the dark and dead of night.



I may be a frequent critic of "the current incumbent" (to use your passive aggressive phrase) and lord knows I've been a harsh critic of police misconduct at other times, in other contexts, but I'll take the "current incumbent" any day if you're the other choice with your b.s. anti-police rhetoric.



As for your tomato plants...



GOOD LUCK WITH THAT, Melissa. I've got your tomato RIGHT HERE!



SPLAT!!!!!!!

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JNS BLOG EXCLUSIVE: "The Devil" Is Being Exorcised From 3020 6th St. N.

Photo By John Hoff

Word comes from a highly-placed and reliable source as follows: CitiMortgage no longer owns 3020 6th St. N. Somehow, they managed to unload that sucker on Deutschebank, which now owns this notorious Pandora's box of drug and prostitution evil, located in the very heart of our planned Eco Village utopia, THE NECESSARY FINAL PIECE IN THE PUZZLE OF OUR MASTER PLAN!!!!

CURSES!!!!

There is good news, however....

The current owner, Deutschebank, and the current servicer, American Home Mortgage Servicing, are working closely and cooperatively with the Hawthorne Neighborhood Council to remain within the letter of the law while actively achieving the goal of throwing the crackhead scum out in the street. Legally.

This is my characterization, and not that of my source, who would never say "crackhead scum," even off the record, but would remain polished and professional.

This is what the people need to know: everything is going well. Have faith. Urban utopia is just around the corner and we've already seen two months with NO REPORTED CRIME in the Eco Village. With 3020 6th St. N. soon going down, now is the time for home owners to buy, buy, buy in the area near 3020 6th St. N.

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3024 6th St. N. Goes Down--"The Devil" Is In The Detailed Back Story Of Crack, Prostitution, And Overdue Water Bills

Contributed Photo

An anonymous source I will identify only as a "Hawthorne resident" sent me the juicy "back story" of how 3024 6th St. N. came to be demolished today. The story came as an email, which I'm printing as it arrived except for inserting paragraph breaks, and so forth.

Here it is...

Through PPL, we tried to purchase this property from Evannor (Haymon) quite some time ago. It is a parcel that is included in Phase I, so it is a crucial piece of the EcoVillage. It was well known that Evannor was running prostitution out of that property at the time we were trying to purchase it. But because of rules associated with the funding we had available to buy the place, if we even got to a certain point in negotations while the building was still occupied, we'd have to pay relocation fees.

Well, the neighborhood had no intention of paying possibly tens of thousands of dollars to the devil's demons and demonesses, even if it wasn't technically "our money." (Side note: if we had done that, he may have had enough money to pay the mortgage on 3020 and then where would we be?)

Plus, we just knew that he'd fill the place up with "tenants" to maximize the relocation dollars and really screw us over even more if we started playing that game. Oh, and of COURSE he wanted significantly more than market value for the property anyway, and what little negotiations we could have were nowhere near productive.

At the time, he was significantly behind on the water bill. (JNS says: a conversation with my source said the water bill was, at one point, in the thousands...which is really hard to pull off, considering how cheap municipal water is in the "City of Lakes.")

So we figured the easiest and fastest way to vacate the property was to shut of the water, declare it unsanitary for habitation, and then keep it vacant long enough so that relocation fees no longer applied.

Well, we did just that, but somehow water still continued to flow to the property. We were mystified. It turns out he had broken the stop mechanism in the street so that turning off the water elsewhere had no effect. And this also revealed to us an interesting bureaucratic loophole. As long as water was flowing to the property, it could not be declared "unsanitary for habitation." It didn't matter whether the water was LEGALLY flowing to the property or not.

We then got the required repair on the city's to-do list, but kept on getting the equivalent of a bad customer service automated response like "Thank you for contacting the city with your concern. All maintenance requests are handled in the order they are received." We couldn't even get an ESTIMATED time of when they'd get to the repairs.

In our predicament, Council Member Diane Hofstede was absolutely integral to our getting the situation resolved. I know there've been concerns about her responsiveness in Hawthorne, and some of those concerns were valid. But she hit it out of the park on this one. Thanks to her work with us, this repair issue got moved to the top of the list and the water was finally shut off. Prostitutes were vacated and forced to go...well, next door, (to 3020 6th St. N.) but at least with no relocation dollars in hand.

We tried to buy 3024 from the devil again, but of course he still wanted way too much money. But wihtout any income from the place, it quickly went into foreclosure--quickly enough that we're pretty sure it was already pretty far down that path.

Once the bank foreclosed, we were able to purchase it from them at a fair market price. And that's the back story to 3024 6th St N.

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South Minneapolis Gets Prostitution Stings, North Minneapolis Just Gets Prostitution

So I was on the Minneapolis City Attorney's website tonight, looking for opportunities to submit neighborhood impact statements, and I thought it was about time to get around to writing a blog post that I've contemplated writing for about a year, now.

Here's the deal. South Minneapolis gets all the police resources for prostitution stings. What does North Minneapolis get? Well, we get the actual prostitutes themselves instead of any sting operations.

Yes, whores can parade up and down Lyndale Ave. N, but will we ever get a (expletive) sting operation up here to thin out the herd?

Not likely. In fact, check out...

...this data, which I pulled off the city attorney website by searching under "livability crimes" and then narrowing it down to just "prostitution." Check out the addresses where these (alleged) crimes took place. THERE IS EXACTLY *ONE* INSTANCE OF A PROSTITUTION ARREST IN NORTH MINNEAPOLIS? How the heck did THAT happen? If I had to guess, I'd think it was some kind of accident.

Meanwhile, our City Councilperson Diane Hofstede has a proposal to ban indoor couches on lawns.

Is that really such a good idea? I MEAN, WHERE WILL ALL THE NORTH MINNEAPOLIS PROSTITUTES GO WITH THEIR DATES?!?!!!!!

Some city leaders really need to straighten out their "livability" priorities. Check out the police action in East Minneapolis and South Minneapolis and then compare with the reality we experience in North Minneapolis. (And when I say "North Minneapolis" I obviously don't mean HOMEWOOD, just for the record)

Court Case Offense Date Defendant Name Precinct Incident Address Case Type Status Warrant Court Date


27CR06083930 10/3/2006 Early, Paulette Latrice 3rd 25th St E Prostitution Open Yes 4/22/2008
27CR07045123 5/16/2007 Graham, Shannon Dawn 3rd Clinton Ave S Prostitution Open Yes 5/14/2008
27CR07102768 7/26/2007 Early, Paulette Latrice 3rd 37th St E Prostitution Open No 9/14/2007
27CR07106035 6/11/2007 Cottier, Stacie Lynn 3rd 33rd St E Prostitution Open No 8/27/2007
27CR07106043 6/14/2007 Pierce, Cindy Sue 3rd 37th St E Prostitution Warrant-bench Yes 8/4/2008
27CR07106187 5/2/2007 Abrahamson, Nathan Allen 3rd 13th Ave S Prostitution Open No 11/20/2007
27CR07106248 6/21/2007 Docter, Bryce Arthur 5th 19th St E Prostitution Open No 8/31/2007
27CR07106313 8/13/2007 Robinson, Tangela Devell 3rd 22nd St E Prostitution Open No 8/30/2007
27CR07106324 5/2/2007 Avila, Luis Mario Cuzco 3rd 13th Ave S Prostitution Open Yes 10/18/2007
27CR07106625 5/2/2007 Alvarado, Miguel 3rd 13th Ave S Prostitution Open No 9/11/2007
27CR07106832 5/2/2007 Christensen, Clinton John 3rd 13th Ave S Prostitution Open No 11/7/2007
27CR07106886 6/28/2007 Nygard, Shannon Marie 3rd 32nd St E Prostitution Open No 3/7/2008
27CR07106940 6/28/2007 Turvey, Kelly Marie 3rd 31st St E Prostitution Open No 11/6/2007
27CR07106941 6/18/2007 Kainulainen, Mari Nimi 3rd 31st St E Prostitution Open No 10/2/2007
27CR07106943 6/14/2007 Martz, Melissa Lynn 3rd 24th St E Prostitution Closed No 10/4/2007
27CR07106963 6/14/2007 Hall, Janet Elizabeth 3rd 16th Ave S Prostitution Open No 10/9/2007
27CR07106964 6/14/2007 Williams, Denise Mervine 3rd 17th Ave S Prostitution Open No 10/2/2007
27CR07106968 6/14/2007 Isaac, Julia Grace 3rd 24th St E Prostitution Open No 10/3/2007
27CR07116396 7/18/2007 Duffy, Deontay Tramel 3rd 32nd St E Prostitution Open No 11/8/2007
27CR07119400 8/22/2007 Lawson, Vickie Kay Prostitution Open Yes 3/31/2009
27CR07119401 7/19/2007 Jimenez-Martinez, Jose Luis 3rd 13 Av S Prostitution Open No 11/27/2007
27CR07122658 6/21/2007 Lynch, Jeannine Danielle 3rd Psf Ave S Prostitution Closed Yes 4/29/2008
27CR07126257 8/29/2007 Eckdahl, Diana Sue 5th 5410 Penn Ave S Prostitution Closed No 10/27/2008
27CR07129469 12/18/2007 Worley, Zenda Louy 3rd 32nd St E Prostitution Open No 3/13/2008
27CR07130714 12/26/2007 Hart, Stephanie Marie 3rd 5th Ave S Prostitution Closed No 3/18/2008
27CR07130728 12/26/2007 Megenuph, Kris Lynn 3rd 31st St E Prostitution Closed No 1/25/2008
27CR07131107 12/4/2007 Graham, Shannon Dawn 3rd 3rd Ave S Prostitution Open Yes 2/12/2008
27CR0814377 1/25/2008 Anthony, Shawnna Ranee 5th Franklin Ave W Prostitution Open Yes 4/9/2009
27CR0814386 5/16/2007 Hart, Stephanie Marie 3rd Lake St E Prostitution Open Yes 3/19/2009
27CR0814725 3/24/2008 Taber, Dawn Marie 1st 4 13rd Av S Prostitution Closed No 4/17/2008
27CR0815308 3/25/2008 Mancera-Recendis, Carlos Alberto 3rd Clinton Ave S Prostitution Closed No 8/26/2008
27CR0815727 3/30/2008 Peplinski, Cassandra Rose 3rd 10th Ave S Prostitution Closed No 4/17/2008
27CR0816682 4/2/2008 Fisherman, Krista Marie 3rd 2nd Ave S Prostitution Closed Yes 6/3/2008
27CR0816696 4/2/2008 Blunt, Brittney Lyn 3rd 3rd Ave S Prostitution Open No 4/18/2008
27CR0822912 5/7/2008 Defoe, Nancy Marie 3rd 2601 16th Ave S Prostitution Closed No 5/14/2008
27CR0822913 5/8/2008 Graham, Shannon Dawn 3rd 3rd Ave S Prostitution Open No 3/31/2009
27CR0822915 5/4/2008 Harris, Jerry Nmn 3rd 5th Ave S Prostitution Open No 8/21/2008
27CR0822925 5/7/2008 Lee, Vernon Gregory 3rd 5th Ave S Prostitution Closed No 6/23/2008
27CR0822932 5/7/2008 Zuluaga-Perez, Salvador Nmn 3rd 5th Ave S Prostitution Open No 6/11/2008
27CR0823404 5/12/2008 Hunt, Brittney Marie 3rd 32nd St E Prostitution Open No 5/13/2008
27CR0824751 5/14/2008 Roche, Constance Marie 5th 1st Ave S Prostitution Closed No 5/22/2008
27CR0825537 5/21/2008 Stewart, Kimberly Dawn 3rd 5th Ave S Prostitution Closed No 6/6/2008
27CR0835591 7/16/2008 Walker, Little Doris 3rd 31st St E Prostitution Open No 10/28/2008
27CR0837449 7/16/2008 Kier, Tresa Lynn 3rd 15th Ave S Prostitution Open No 8/19/2008
27CR0838392 7/31/2008 Widstrom, Karen Eve 3rd 201 Lake St E Prostitution Closed No 10/21/2008
27CR0838394 7/31/2008 Buenano, Maria Rosario 3rd 3rd Ave S Prostitution Closed No 8/27/2008
27CR083966 11/20/2007 Graham, Shannon Dawn 3rd 3rd Ave S Prostitution Open Yes 3/31/2009
27CR0840578 5/20/2008 Simpson, Elise Nmn 29th St E Prostitution Open No 5/26/2009
27CR084124 1/22/2008 Isaac, Julia Grace 3rd Bloomington Ave S Prostitution Open No 2/20/2008
27CR0842279 8/20/2008 Brown, Jaquila Lashey 3rd 32nd St E Prostitution Open No 10/30/2008
27CR0844877 7/10/2008 Daly, Jacqueline Ann 3rd 31st St E Prostitution Open No 9/30/2008
27CR0847472 7/2/2008 Abdelwahab, Alice Margret 3rd 28th St E Prostitution Open No 12/2/2008
27CR0857513 1/9/2008 Williams, Leatrice Nmn 3rd 15th Av S Prostitution Open No 4/2/2009
27CR08603 1/2/2008 Armstrong, Judy Vone 3rd 4th Ave S Prostitution Closed No 2/12/2008
27CR086160 2/5/2008 Mefford, Denise Suzanne 2nd 1404 26th Ave Ne Prostitution Warrant-bench Yes 5/8/2008
27CR086825 2/6/2008 Adams, Louise Nmn 3rd 24th St E Prostitution Open No 2/11/2008
27CR087145 11/7/2007 Peet, Angela Nina-Marie 3rd 5750 33rd Ave S Prostitution Open Yes 10/28/2008
27CR087733 1/4/2008 Davis, Cynthia 3rd 3rd Ave S Prostitution Open No 3/7/2008
27CR087776 1/19/2008 Jackson, Violet Grace 3rd 31st St E Prostitution Closed Yes 7/14/2008
27CR087801 12/18/2007 Warner, Ronda Rose 3rd 4th Ave S Prostitution Open No 3/11/2008
27CR0910151 8/21/2008 Enriquez-Sanchez, Jose Alain 13rd Av S Prostitution Open No 3/25/2009
27CR0910152 8/21/2008 Chimborazo Chimborazo, Jose Antonio 13rd Av S Prostitution Open No 3/25/2009
27CR0910153 8/21/2008 Pomoquiza-Chimborazo, Pablo Alejandro 13rd Av S Prostitution Open No 3/25/2009
27CR0910155 8/21/2008 Kron, James Robert 13rd Av S Prostitution Open No 3/25/2009
27CR0910156 8/21/2008 Shaw, Jefferson Joe 13rd Av S Prostitution Open No 4/1/2009
27CR0911097 8/21/2008 Huerta-Rodriquez, Salvador 3012 13rd Av S Prostitution Open No 3/25/2009
27CR0911100 8/21/2008 Orellana Orellana, Pablo Fabian 13rd Av S Prostitution Open No 3/25/2009
27CR0911111 8/21/2008 Irvin, Andre Maurice 13rd Av S Prostitution Open No 3/25/2009
27CR0911112 8/21/2008 Schmidt, Cory Lee 13rd Av S Prostitution Open No 3/25/2009
27CR0912849 3/12/2009 Collins, Tammy Terrell 4th 26th Av N Prostitution Open No 3/17/2009
27CR091289 3/26/2008 Whipple, Juliean Lea 3rd 16th Ave S Prostitution Open No 1/30/2009

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Mysterious Death At 2222 4th St. N. (JOHNNY NORTHSIDE BLOG EXCLUSIVE DETAILS About The Miserable, Run-Down Property In Question)

Photos By John Hoff

For some reason, none of the media is willing to state the specific address of the run-down, decrepit dump of a property where a woman's body was found recently, click here for the story as told by WCCO.

I'm familiar with...

...the house in question. In fact, I once called 311 on the house for having no address number visible on the front exterior, and then a big green "2222" mysteriously appeared shortly after that on the board over the front door. Well, better than nothing, I guess.

Not A Gas Leak After All

Actually, Jeff and I drove past the crime scene while it was being processed. This was some time after the news crews had left, apparently, or before they all arrived. Even though both ends of the alley were blocked off, I didn't think much of it. I figured there was yet another gas leak from crackheads stealing copper pipes, because the fire department's procedure of blocking both ends of an alley looked similar to what I've seen before with these North Minneapolis gas leaks.

A house might explode. Shrug. Well, guess I can't cut through the alley.

The next day, I read about a woman's body being found in the garage, frozen. (So frozen one media outlet said she'd have to "thaw" before the autopsy took place) Some emails flew around the neighborhood. Michael Klick had heard gunshots on Sunday night during the snowstorm, and he couldn't help but think it might be connected to the woman's body being found in the garage.

"In Extreme Disrepair"

If the city's online property records are current--and you could break bones tripping over such a big "if"--the owner of the property is somebody named Mahmood Khan, whose address is listed at 2972 Old Highway 8 Roseville, MN 55113. So if the media are reporting the "owner" of the property came out to check the place, and found the body, then one assumes it was Mahmood Khan who found the body. (Unless the house has been sold to somebody else and the city's records just aren't up-to-date, which is common)

On September 25--the very day of the Hawthorne Annual Meeting--there was a meeting at City Hall regarding this property. (One supposes the meeting may have involved other properties, too) The meeting was held by the Nuisance Condition Process Review Panel. Board members, an assistant city attorney, and folks from inspections (including good ol' Wayne Murphy) were at the meeting, and so was Mahmood Khan, representing himself.

The board found as follows: 2222 4th St. N. is a two-family home in the Hawthorne neighborhood. The (garbled) story structure was built in 1900. Each unit has four rooms, including one bathroom and one bedroom. The building is 1,623 square feet. (...) (On all three floors)

The property is in extreme disrepair. There are 27 open housing orders on the property, most as a result of the Code Compliance Inspection conducted in April, 2008. The basement is moldy, there are holes in the walls, water damage shows on the ceilings throughout the house, kitchens and bathrooms have been trashed, the copper has been stripped and the roof is substandard.

The inspections department found the estimated cost to rehab the building is $129,843 to $234,372 based on the means square foot estimate. The assessed value of the property in 2007 was $147,000. The 2008 assessed value is $70,000. The Preservation and Design Team staff didn't find the property worth preserving.

The Hawthorne Area Community Council (the former name of HNC) and property owners within 350 feet of the property were mailed a request for a community impact statement. Three were received, all of which said the house had a negative impact on the neighborhood and should be demolished.

How We Got Into This Mess

Yong Yia Vue purchased the property on December 1, 2005. The property went into foreclosure and a sheriff's sale was conducted on June 20, 2006, with Deutsche Bank National Trust as Trustee for AMC Mortgage Services submitting the highest bid. The redemption period expired on December 20, 2007, and the property was put up for sale "as is."

On July 17, 2007, the property was condemned for being a boarded building and added to the City's Vacant Building Registration. The property has remained vacant and boarded since that time.

On April 1, 2008, a Code Compliance Inspection was ordered and paid for by Kyle White, the realtor attempting to sell the property. On June 25, 2008, the current owner, Mahmood Khan, purchased the property.

A Notice Of The Director's Order to Raze and Remove was mailed on July 23, 2008 to AMC Mortgage Services, Inc., Young Yia Vue, Kyle White, Vang Phay, Argent Mortgage Co. and Shapiro, Nordmeyer and Zielke.

On August 19, 2008, Mahmood Khan filed an appeal indicating "Code Compliance, will be brought up to code by licensed contractors."

On September 22, 2008 Mr. Khan sent the Department of Inspections an estimate to rehabilitate the property at a cost of $100,000 but was unable to meet with staff to discuss a restoration agreement detailng the proposed rehabilitation including timelines for completion.

Mr. Khan stated at the hearing that he plans to convert the building to a single family home with hope to provide housing to low-income families. Mr. Habib Moghul spoke on the owner's behalf and indicated he has seen the owner do good work in rehabbing other houses in the city.

(...) The city of Minneapolis found evidence, "including but not limited to neighborhood impact statements, clearly demonstrates that the values of neighborhood properties have diminished as a result of deterioration of the subject building" and also "rehabilitation is not justified when compared to the after rehab resale value of the building."

Recommendation to Raze upheld by the board.

Observations By "Boots On The Ground"

I was giving Hawthorne Housing Director Jeff Skrenes a ride to pick up his newly-repaired vehicle, and I took a detour to 2222 4th St. N., now clear of police and gawkers...though plenty of ribbons of crime scene tape were left hanging all over.

I advocate making that stuff out of corn starch polymer. My little Green Party plug, here, for a small public policy tweak to help the environment.

The "garage" in question is small. It appears to be one of the many old "carriage houses" which dot the back yards of North Minneapolis. The garage had been newly re-boarded with an official, gray board. A couch was near the garage, with a blue crime scene latex glove on it. It seemed as though the couch may have been hauled out of the garage. The cushions of the couch were missing. If the body was on the couch, then I figure these cushions were taken along with the body for some kind of analysis...though Jeff speculated the corpse may have been frozen to the cushions.

Of course...we don't really know if the deceased person was on that couch or not. But what's up with that big missing chunk of hand rest?

The house is a monstrosity. You can't really call it a duplex, despite an odd, engraved metal sign declaring "THIS IS A DUPLEX." Jeff had never seen anything like that sign, and wondered what was the point. The house seemed to be a small gray stucco thing which had some kind of horrible addition added, then pranced around shrieking, "Look at me! I'm a duplex!"

I note the findings of the City of Minneapolis went out of its way to avoid use of the word "duplex." Some kind of legality is a-simmering, here, or was at one time.

Paint Cans In The Mail Slot

Properly acting under the City of Minneapolis' publicized mandate for responsible citizens to "adopt" vacant and neglected properties, I wanted to see if any letters were stuck in the mail slot, so I could shove that stuff further into the house to help thwart mail fraud. That was when me and Jeff found the front porch was full of paint cans...waist high, it appeared, piled up just beyond the mail slot in the front porch. Who knew how many, but probably a lot. Jeff said the place was being used as a "dumping ground."

I noticed some of the vinyl siding had been pried upon...just enough for somebody to find out it was vinyl, not aluminum. Windows were missing on the second story, allowing blowing snow to enter the house.

This house is a monstrosity. I would like to think something like this incident would change the mind of the owner about trying to rehab it, but it's pretty hard to transform the hardwired slumlord mindset: nothing a coat of paint won't fix.

The proceedings against this house should move from back burner to front burner. But I think most residents are just wondering: how did this woman die? And if it was foul play, who did it? And who was she? Those are answers we're still waiting for...while she, um, thaws.

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Get Out Of My Neighborhood, Street Walkers

Photos By John Hoff

A posting by Hawthorne's newest blogger which mentioned chasing some prostitutes off her street reminded me of a recent incident on Lyndale Avenue North...

I was driving my van "Chick Magnet 2" near the Eco Village, when a woman tried to hail me like I was a taxi of loooooooooooooooove.

She used a crooked finger "come thee hither" gesture, which is interesting...I've never seen a hooker use that particular gesture before. But there are a lot of variations on the basic "Hey, sailor" hail, everything from meaningful repeated head jerks to the frantic double-hand-wave with full flailing arms, like you're trying to make yourself visible to a Medivac helicopter.

How odd, I thought. Hookers on Lyndale Avenue North during the BEGINNING of the month, and not the END of the month. The economy is getting worse before it gets better, it appears, just like Obama said.

I circled the block, calling 911, and when I went around the block a second time the (alleged) hooker was far from the bus stop, expecting me to pull over, smiling broadly. The third time I went around the block, I had my camera out. That was when the (alleged) prostitute and her shorter, arguably much prettier companion began walking rapidly toward Lowry Avenue North, but the taller one had been walking to my car until I pulled out my camera.

I got a couple of pictures, then yelled to inform them I'd called the police, and it was best not to return to this part of the neighborhood. Words to that effect. I don't know if the police came or had other more urgent calls, but sometimes the police work as a promise rather than something actually delivered.

Not five minutes later, I was in the middle of ANOTHER incident on that part of Lyndale Avenue North. See next blog post.

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