Old couches, discarded junk, bags of garbage, soil and railway trusses are just some of the items scattered around 7647 Willard St. The property was the site of the Globe Foundry until it closed in 2011. Since then, it’s been used as a dumping ground for trash and unwanted items.
Residents in the area are calling attention to the neighbourhood eyesore in hopes the City of Burnaby will take action against the owner.
“It’s the ugliest place in the neighbourhood,” said Elena Zhukova, who lives a short distance from the property.
Three years ago, a fire just about destroyed the site of the former Globe Foundry. In the fire’s wake, people started discarding garbage on the property. Neighbours recalled seeing bags of trash scattered among bits of charred debris from the fire.
With the owners nowhere to be found, the city stepped in and cleaned up the site.
But the property didn’t stay clean for long, according to Shairose Lila, who lives down the street.
Shortly after city crews cleared the property, Lila and her neighbours noticed garbage being dumped on the empty land. By last December, they had had enough and started contacting the city once again to complain about the unsightly mess.
But the City of Burnaby told Lila there’s nothing it can do because the property is private land.
“(They) said to me, explicitly, it was a private property and they (the city) cannot come on the property,” she told the NOW.
Lila said she was told that cleaning up the site and billing the owner, as the city has done in the past, wouldn’t address the issue of the absentee owner, and it’s up to the owner to secure the property so dumping doesn’t happen.
But that leaves Riverside residents wondering what role the city has in dealing with unsightly properties.
Last summer, Zhukova spotted a man on the site. He told her he was the owner and that he had big plans for the site. He didn’t give a name or anything and he hasn’t been seen since, she said.
“The whole of his conversation was how great he is and he’s going to build something magnificent here, and again the whole thing is something should be done now,” Zhukova said.
A recent land title search by the Burnaby NOW revealed the registered owner of the property is still Globe Foundry Ltd., the company that has owned the land since the foundry opened in the 1940s. The family that owned the business, however, abandoned the site in 2011. Since then, attempts have been made to reach the owners, including several by the NOW and the City of Burnaby when the story first broke in 2014, but so far no one has been able to track them down.
The land title search, however, also indicated a pending application to transfer ownership. This could mean someone may have bought the property, but the documents don’t indicate who that person or company might be, and the City of Burnaby wouldn’t provide any details.
Andy Dhaliwal, property use coordinator for the city’s licensing department, wouldn’t say who the owner was he was trying to contact but did say that in the case of a sale, the process to bring the property into compliance with city bylaws would restart with the city reaching out to the new owners to come to a resolution.
Dhaliwal said the city has received four complaints regarding the property in the past few months
“I can also confirm we are working towards achieving compliance with our unsightly premises bylaw,” he told the NOW.
While he wouldn’t get into specifics about the situation at 7647 Willard St., he said the licensing department’s policy is to work with the owner to resolve the issue. This means notifying the owner of the problem, creating a timeline to get the site into compliance and if, that doesn’t work, moving forward on fines.
“The road to compliance is dependent on considerable variables, which are unique to each file,” he said.
The NOW asked Dhaliwal when he expects the property to be cleaned, but he couldn’t say. Instead, his message to unhappy neighbours was twofold: he is hopeful the owner will comply with the city’s request to clean up the site, and anyone with concerns could contact him directly.
Troubled site has a long history
1940s: The Globe Foundry, operated by the Ewasiuk family, opens at 7647 Willard St.
2011: The foundry closes and the property is left abandoned.
May 2013: A 56-year-old man and 59-year-old woman living on the property were found dead in their trailer. Investigators say a gas leak caused by a propane generator was likely the culprit.
November 2013: Neighbours begin calling the city to complain about the unsightliness of the site at 7647 Willard St. In total, five official complaints are logged between November 2013 and May 2014.
Jan. 4, 2014: A fire burns down the abandoned foundry buildings. Fire investigators consider the incident suspicious, but no arrests are ever made.
March 4, 2014: Residents appear in the Burnaby NOW to complain about people dumping garbage on the site. The property owners are nowhere to be found.
April 28, 2014: City council gets set to approve recommendations laid out in a city manager’s report to allow staff onto the Globe Foundry property to bring it into compliance with Burnaby’s unsightly premises bylaw.
May 13, 2014: City council approves the above recommendation and gives the property owner 30 days to clean the site or else city staff would take over and bill the owners.
Summer 2014: City of Burnaby staff clean up the property after the foundry owners failed to comply within 30 days.
December 2016: Riverside residents contact the City of Burnaby about the accumulation of garbage at 7647 Willard St.
January 2017: More complaints are made to the city regarding the growing mess at the old foundry site. Four official complaints are logged.
Feb. 17, 2017: Neighbours meet with Burnaby NOW reporter Cayley Dobie at 7647 Willard St. Later that day, a City of Burnaby employee contacts Shairose Lila to tell her staff will be putting forward a proposal to council to have the property cleaned.
