Jax Councilman: Abandoned mobile homes used as ‘trap houses’

Jacksonville City Councilman Reggie Brown has noticed a problem in his district with no current solution in municipal code.

That problem? Abandoned mobile homes.

A number of these structures in his Northwest Jacksonville district have been in place and empty since he took office in 2010.

Some of them, Brown says, are used as “trap houses” — dens of vice and crime.

“No one monitors them,” Brown told us last week. “Kids are going in” and using them for all manner of nefarious purposes.

The structures have been cited by code enforcement, yet “nothing ever happens.”

A bill Councilman Brown filed last week may change that.

Bill 2017-432 would allow for the removal of mobile homes and other modular structures that aren’t connected to utilities on the grounds of being a “public nuisance.”

The same would hold true for structures constructed or left on a property without a permit.

Brown has introduced legislation before to deal with code gaps that create issues for his district that may not be seen elsewhere in the city.

Two examples: proposed moratorium on block parties this year, and proposed ban on backing into driveways in 2015, as abandoned vehicles have been used as drop points for extralegal transactions.

The needs of his district are different from other areas, with HOAs and other mechanisms discouraging such clutter in newer neighborhoods.

Expect Brown’s bill to find its way into committees later this summer.