Police records show 53 disturbance calls to vacant Minneapolis apt. building that burned down
MINNEAPOLIS – WCCO is digging into the suspicious background of a condemned apartment building that caught fire in Minneapolis Saturday.
The four-story apartment was on Lyndale Avenue in the Lowry Hill East neighborhood.
Police records show that officers were called to the building 53 times over the last year for various reasons, including trespassing, burglary, narcotics use and in one case, they had found someone had died in the building in November.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives announced Monday that its national response team arrived over the weekend to assist in the investigation.
"Investigating a fire of this size is time consuming and requires an all-hands-on-deck approach," said Minnesota State Fire Marshal Jim Smith. "The partnership of our federal and local agencies is critical and always appreciated, especially with a fire of this magnitude."
The privately-owned apartment building was condemned back in July. James Groethe is the owner of Leaning Tower of Pizza, which is next door. Groethe says in the last year especially, he's seen several people come and go from that building, even though it was boarded up.
"We knew that wasn't going to be the end of it because they just broke into the building again and again and again," said Groethe.
Squatters made the vacant building their home, and neighbors witnessed some dangerous behavior.
"There was a lot of drug activity and it did affect our business," said Groethe. "My staff was afraid a lot of times to walk home. I had staff that were mugged on their way home."
Bill Holmes lives just up the road in Loring Park. He lives next door to a building that is also owned by the same person who owned the Lyndale building. Property records show C. David George owns both of these multi-unit buildings that are both now condemned.
"There's severely lacking oversight by city government," said Holmes. "What we saw in our neighborhood is that the building was not maintained, the building was not secured, the building was not monitored."
Neighbors just hope this fire is a wake-up call to city officials to take action on repeat problem areas, and find a solution for the unhoused.
"That building was not the answer and was not a sustainable answer to correcting that problem," said Groethe. "I wish the city could have done something about it a long time ago."
WCCO reached out to Mayor Jacob Frey's office. In a statement he said:
Thank you to the firefighters and first responders who responded quickly to yesterday's fire. The City's Regulatory Services Department has been actively working to educate the property owner of their responsibilities, including around security requirements at the condemned and vacant building in question. City leadership will continue to monitor and assess this property and will explore enforcement actions as necessary.
WCCO also reached out to property owner C. David George, and have not heard back.
