The city’s management of its vacant properties and communication between departments is under scrutiny after a fire battalion chief complained that little to nothing was done to secure an empty library building after a fire there in April and a second, larger blaze weeks later where a firefighter broke his ankle.
The 99-year-old Miller Avenue Library, which is on the National Registry of Historic Places, has been vacant for years and overrun by squatters. After an April 8 fire, the building was ordered boarded up. But people quickly got inside again and a larger, more destructive fire broke out April 25. It was at that fire that an unidentified firefighter was injured.