‘The Refrigerator is Gone’: Milford Resident Thankful for Cleanup

The threat of a hefty $100-per-day fine seems to have sparked an unresponsive property owner to clean up his beachfront property left damaged by storms since Hurricane Irene.

“The refrigerator is gone!!!” Thomas Christmann, a neighbor on Bridgewater Avenue, tells Milford Patch in an email Wednesday.

Christmann filed grievances with the Milford Health Department in March and April about the blight conditions at 16 and 20 Bridgewater Ave.

Earlier this month, he told Patch that his main concern was the well-being of his 15-month-old son. He said he had found needles on the properties and worried about his son wandering into the rubble.

“It’s what’s between my house and the water,” he said.

He also said the neglected properties were attracting trespassers, including the homeless.

Following Christmann’s and others’ complaints, letters were sent to the property owners informing them that their properties were in violation of the city’s blight ordinance.

The second of two letters gave a July 1 deadline for the blight conditions to be remedied or else suffer a $100-per-day fine beginning July 2.

Both property owners had not responded as of June 18, according to the health department. But now Christmann says the large pile of rubble at 16 Bridgewater Ave., which included the refrigerator, has been cleared.

“It was recently cleaned up and has made my wife and I feel much better about letting my son out of our house,” he wrote in an email to Health Director Dennis McBride.

Christmann said nothing’s changed at 20 Bridgewater Ave. The property owner there will have until July 1 before the fine takes effect.