Whose Responsibility?

Every day I ride my bicycle past this "development" on Franklin Blvd., each of the housal units within are probably worth $231 less than the day before:

Only now we also get a nice pile of brush at the end of the walkway -- and why not, this is an empty field alongside a collector road at the end of a county-code mandated sidewalk that no one has or will ever walk on...so pile it on. This "public realm" means nothing if the public ain't using it.

Who, exactly, would be responsible for this pile of brush? Who would I call to have this taken care of?

The developer?

No way. His/her responsibility ended at the beautiful capped end-post.

Street maintenance division?

No way. Their responsibility ended at the curb cut.

The county?

No way. Their responsibility would have included the sidewalks, but because there ain't no sidewalk here, they have no jurisdiction. They couldn't even step foot on the dirt.

Public works?

Again, where's the public? Where are the works? Because there aren't any of either, they most certainly have no jurisdiction. No way.

Economic development?

Hardly. It's a major stretch to be calling the development development, let alone a brownfield across from vacant strip retail. Not a whole lot of an economy going on, either. So, no way.

Traffic Bureau?

The brush is not a menace, either now or anticipated to be, to vehicular traffic on Franklin Blvd., so, no way. While it could be argued that it is a menace to pedestrians, the traffic bureau, via carefully crafted language in their code, has deemed pedestrians "obstacles to traffic ...not traffic per se."

Street Sweeping?

No way. It's not on the street, remember?

Garbage & Recycling?

No way. There's no billable address here, and besides, the brush isn't contained inside an approved green-waste container, so the truck has no way of loading it in without...sigh...human labor beforehand...and it's not their job to be loading brush into containers. Understandably so.

So, the brush, tumbleweeds, Jack In The Box hamburger wrappers, go-gurt tubes, Sunny-D plastic bottles, and the dilapidated chain link fence will sit, underneath a beautiful new banner every six months proclaiming how the housal units within are only becoming cheaper by the day. You might wonder who would buy one of these units today. I don't wonder. They are people who have never seen this progression of banners from $300,000, to under $200,000, to $149,000, and who probably assume some sort of guaranteed taxpayer government intervention if horrors! housal prices fall even further so they won't be on the hook for an underwater investment. Freddie or Fannie will take over the mortgage if, in another six months, a new $119,000 banner is hoisted.

In every detail, from the government guaranteed backed loans to the pile of debris to the lack of integrated community development-- no one is responsible.