Tales of three abandoned homes

Residents discuss living near vacant, boarded neighboring houses

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Zombie homes, a common result of Long Island’s foreclosure crisis several years ago, are becoming the focus of several efforts to rejuvenate the homes and put them in the hands of veterans in need.

Last week, Congressman Steve Israel announced the Housing Our Heroes Act, a three-year pilot program that would provide $25 million in grant money to veterans service organizations and non-governmental organizations. These organizations would then buy and fix up blighted properties for homeless veterans, and take unsightly zombie homes off the market. Additionally, earlier this year, Suffolk County proposed to transfer eight tax-defaulted properties to non-profit agencies to rehabilitate the homes and create affordable housing for homeless and at-risk veterans.

News of the efforts couldn’t be more welcomed by West Hempstead resident Cay Fatima, who lives directly across the street from one zombie home located at 11 Scaneatatles Ave., and close to another at 1060 Woodfield Rd. The Scaneatatles house, she said, was abandoned in 2009, and the Woodfield Road house was abandoned in 2010.

“I would love to have a veteran family on our block,” said Fatima of the recent announcements. “The majority of our veterans are hard working, and we really need people like that in our community for it to stay stable and continue upward growth,” she said.

Fatima, who has lived in her Scaneatatles home for most of her life, told the sad story of the Dubow family who lived across the street in a once well-kept home. “The homeowners were elderly, and they passed away,” said Fatima, who added that the house was left to the couple’s son after they died. Fatima discovered soon after, through the help of the Town of Hempstead’s building department, that the house went into foreclosure around 2008.

Currently, 11 Scaneatatles Ave, and its backyard garbage, is boarded up, covered in graffiti, and has a ”Structure Unfit for Human Occupancy” sign pasted to its front entrance by the Town of Hempstead. It’s been that way for at least the past two years, Fatima said.

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