WESTON — The city of Weston has started the tedious but important process of cleaning up its dilapidated structures, according to city and WVU officials.
“Weston is far along in tackling their community blight,” said Luke Esler, project manager of the Northern West Virginia Brownfields Assistance Program, whose organization is providing technical assistance to the city for this effort.
“Weston is very proactive compared to other communities across the state,” Elser said. “The city created a Better Buildings team a few years ago that surveyed the entire area and created an inventory of dilapidated properties. They also have code enforcement, which a lot of communities don’t have.”
The city of Weston and the Weston Better Buildings Committee applied for and will receive technical assistance from the Northern Virginia Brownfields Assistance Program, the Land Use and Sustainable Development Law Clinic at the WVU College of Law, and the West Virginia Community Development Hub to deal with the city’s dilapidated buildings, Esler said.
“Real property expansion and redevelopment or reuse may be complicated by the presence of hazardous substances,” he said. “This could be asbestos in old homes, or abandoned industrial sites, old gas stations, or old tipple site properties where they used to load coal onto coal trucks. We’re talking about contaminated property or property that community thinks is contaminated that isn’t being used as a new house, business, or park.”
The city has already started tackling community blight, said Bryan Reed, the city of Weston’s building inspector and certified code enforcement official.
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