Blight is becoming an issue around Nesquehoning, residents and officials are saying.

Last week, Abbie and Joe Guardiani approached borough council to ask what, if anything, could be done regarding a home behind their house that burned around five years ago and is still standing and unsecured.

Abbie showed council photos of the home on High Street from her home, pointing out that you can see windows and doors open, the ceiling caving in and nothing blocking anyone from entering the structure.

“I’m not a structural engineer and I don’t claim to be and I’m not here to cause trouble but it devaluates our home and devaluated all our homes,” she said. “We’re losing our town.”

John McArdle, Nesquehoning emergency management coordinator and hose company fire chief, told council that two of the homes in the property are owned by a person from Lancaster and that person didn’t have insurance on the home.

Guardiani asked why council can’t partner with neighboring towns like Lansford and Summit Hill to go after grant money that is available to fight blight. She cited a recent article in the Times News announcing a $354,000 DCED grant for Palmerton, Jim Thorpe and Lehighton for a blight remediation pilot program in those communities.

She questioned if the borough has been looking at blight and making a list on where it is located in the town and if anything can be done at all.

Council told her that there is a process that the borough must go through to first obtain a blighted property before being able to tear it down, but even then, they may lose money in the process.

Councilman Louis Paul agreed with the Guardiani, pointing out that he has had a goal to fight blight since he has gotten on council.

“I agree with you 100%,” he said, noting that there are many residents pointing out blighted properties to him.

He added that now is the time to go after these people.

“Where do we start?” Guardiani asked.

Councilman Frank Jacobs said he thought now was a good time to start with this, and brought up a recent letter from Lansford about shared police services, so this may be a good way to start on joint ventures for various services.

Councilman Bruce Nalesnik suggested reaching out to the other boroughs, as well as the three boroughs that received the grant, on how they could go about joining forces and apply for grants to fight blight.

Nalesnik said he sympathized with the Guardianis, and asked council if there was any way of budgeting some money to get the ball rolling before any grants or committees were created or applied for.

Council asked why the borough doesn’t have ownership of the house in question already and RoniSue Ahner, borough secretary, said one of the homes in that structure just sold and the new owner was hoping to purchase the remaining burned-out portions. She added that she hasn’t heard from the new owner in a little while though.

Paul said he would love to move on getting things knocked down soon because there is a list of at least six properties that he would like to see torn down due to falling into disrepair.

Councilwoman Rosemary Porembo said she had discussions about how back taxes could go toward some things like fighting blight.

She commended the Guardianis for bringing this subject up to council.

“We have to team together because there are a lot of new problems. We need to look at money that solves these problems because we love living here. … We have to rearrange how we can do things because I think we’re beyond the 12th hour and we have to look at these things. Now we’re getting to the point where KME is going, we saw properties being sold, we saw other things going down.”

She questioned how these changes would affect the town, as well as the Panther Valley School District.

“If you are getting the same result from what you were doing, and I think that was the case, we need to look at this,” Porembo said.