DETROIT (WWJ) – After watching flames consume her neighbor’s house, one Detroit resident is asking Mayor Dave Bing to take action.
Patricia Finley stood on her porch Wednesday morning and watched as firefighters did their best to put out a fire at a two-family home at the corner of McKay and Burnside streets, between Joseph Campau and I-75 on the city’s border with Hamtramck.
Fire officials say luckily, no one was home at the time of the fire, which left the home completely destroyed. An official cause of the blaze hasn’t yet been determined.
Finley, who’s lived on McKay Street for 47 years, blames drugs from the deplorable conditions on her block and many others throughout the city. She flagged down WWJ’s Vickie Thomas to issue a plea to Mayor Bing.
“Will he please do something about this neighborhood? Houses are being burned down, we’re living in squalor, and I’m sick and tired of it. I’m a taxpayer and I do not want or need to live like this. Please mayor, do something about these abandoned houses over here on McKay Street,” she said.
From the Davison Freeway to Burnside Street, which is roughly seven blocks, Finley said counted 16 abandoned homes.