Be advised, if you own a building and it catches fire, the Anchorage Fire Department may be blaming you for not providing security patrols of your property.
The department issued a statement that assigns blame to the property owner for a major fire last week that was set by vagrants who had taken over a former hotel in Spenard.
“Last week’s fire in Spenard shines a light on the dangers of makeshift sheltering and the need for proactive actions of property owners and the community,” said Chief Doug Schrage, referring to the fire at the former Americas Best Value Inn and Suites.
A good portion of the rooms were haphazardly and dangerously occupied despite most of the openings and exits being boarded up, according to Asst. Chief Brian Dean, Fire Marshal for the Anchorage Fire Department.
“Witnesses reported 30 to 40 people fleeing from the hotel before our firefighters arrived. Thankfully, they were able to rescue the last four individuals that couldn’t escape.”
Chief Schrage said that people should hire security companies to guard their properties.
“Property owners should check on their properties regularly or hire security to verify the properties haven’t been breached and unauthorized encampments haven’t sprouted. If they have, it needs to be reported so we can hopefully prevent a similar incident. This is a life safety issue. We are fortunate everyone made it out of this fire with their lives.”
Due to significant damage and risk of collapse, AFD investigators were unable to completely excavate the room where the fire started, the fire department said.
“While a definitive cause of the fire cannot be determined, there is ample evidence the fire inadvertently started as a result of improvised heating or cooking arrangements,” the fire department said.
In 2020, the Democrat mayor of Anchorage planned to buy the building and turn it into a homeless shelter. That was the plan of Mayor Ethan Berkowitz, who left office in disgrace before finalizing the purchase. His temporary successor, Austin Quinn-Davidson, scrapped the idea because the cost of renovating the hotel was too great.
The building “was supposed to be unoccupied and secured,” the fire department said. There is no power or water to the building and no smoke alarms or sprinklers that are working.
Numerous “buddy heaters, propane tanks, oil lamps, makeshift cooking arrangements and smoking materials were found throughout the ‘unoccupied’ building,” the department said. These apparently were used by the dozens of vagrants that had taken over the building, all without being discovered by police.
“Property owners have an obligation to keep their properties safe and secure. Vacant properties or suspected illegal occupancies can be reported online at #ANCWorks,” the fire department said, shifting public safety back to property owners, rather than the government, which has the job of public safety.
No, arrest the bums and send them back to where they came from, used to be called a “blue ticket”, on Alaska Airlines.
And who is paying this $2.34 million for the homeless? I would say the Anchorage assembly is very generous.
“…the fire inadvertently started as a result of improvised heating or cooking arrangements.”
No kidding? What a brilliant deduction given that the building had no power and was occupied by 30-40 bums.
My opinion of the fire department just went down a whole bunch of notches.
How was the occupancy by vagrants NOT noticed by APD?
They were too busy writing tickets on the glenn
APD and Fire Department needs to be questioned about their neglect of the building, although No matter how well, it can be canvassed, they can’t be there 24 hrs a day straight..Not enough fireman and police to be there litterally. The owners need to hire their own security.
So, how is the APD doing in it’s investigation? That is, for arson, breaking and entering, trespassing? IS any attempt being made to find and prosecute the individuals who endangered 30-40 lives, and have destroyed a valuable property? Somehow, the owners are to blame? Let’s show some sanity, after numerous local arson fires in town, and focus on the criminal (s) who caused this?
As a landlord in Anchorage, I check my property multiple times during the week to ensure no homeless vagrants try to set up camp in the carport, or in a breezeway between buildings or such. I am fortunate that I am able to do so, as I know many property owners are not. But my problem comes when APD is called to address someone who is trying to set up camp on my property (which has happened twice in the last year). They did not arrest them, trespass them, or take any other actions to deter the individual in the future. They just told them they needed to leave, saw them off the property, and then got in their patrol car and left. I saw the same vagrant two days later building a homemade shelter two blocks away on someone else’s property (I called the owner to let them know). This falls squarely on the shoulders of the Mayor and her office, and on the police force’s administration. Law enforcement has had their hands tied. This has to change.
Are any of the dirtbags who were living in there being held for arson? “…the need for proactive actions of property owners..” How about a couple dozen NFL-sized dudes who roust the bums out of there and make sure they keep on walking? That would be proactive. Anchorage residents should organize a program to relocate the homeless, encouraging them to set up in or around city hall. Tell them they are welcome to sleep over after assembly meetings.
Alaska Statutes Title 11. Criminal Law § 11.46.400. Arson in the first degree
(a) A person commits the crime of arson in the first degree if the person intentionally damages any property by starting a fire or causing an explosion and by that act recklessly places another person in danger of serious physical injury. For purposes of this section, “another person” includes but is not limited to fire and police service personnel or other public employees who respond to emergencies, regardless of rank, functions, or duties being performed.
(b) Arson in the first degree is a class A felony.
Alaska Statutes Title 11. Criminal Law § 11.46.410. Arson in the second degree
(a) A person commits the crime of arson in the second degree if the person knowingly damages a building by starting a fire or causing an explosion.
(b) In a prosecution under this section, it is an affirmative defense
(1) that no person other than the defendant had a possessory, proprietary, or security interest in the building or that all persons having such an interest consented to the defendant’s conduct; and
(2) that the sole intent of the defendant was to damage or destroy the building for a lawful purpose.
(c) Arson in the second degree is a class B felony.
Alaska Statutes Title 11. Criminal Law 11.46.430. Criminally negligent burning in the second degree
(a) A person commits the crime of criminally negligent burning in the second degree if with criminal negligence the person damages property of another by fire or explosion.
(b) Criminally negligent burning in the second degree is a class A misdemeanor.
Alaska Statutes 11.81.350. Justification: Use of force in defense of property and premises.
(b) A person may use deadly force upon another when and to the extent the person reasonably believes it necessary to terminate what the person reasonably believes to be the commission or attempted commission of arson upon a dwelling or occupied building.
The city has lost its mind.
City employees have to say what the mayor believes, even if that is not rational, not reasonable, and not reality.
They were testing the new stoves and ovens and reheating the filet mignon. Too much heat.
Yet another spotlight on a skeevy symptom of Anchorage taking a dive to the left. Blame the victim. This is not a good look on the Anchorage Fire Department. Now, they’re shifting from facts to politics. It will become more difficult to believe anything this fire chief says. It’s almost as if he’s regurgitating words from Mayor Suzanne LaFrance.
So, are abandoned property owners authorized to use the necessary means to clear their property? Since they are going to be made responsible for what squatters do. The APD needs to clarify this.
So taxpayers are paying for this vagrant hotel and the fire service rendered. Great. Who are they hoping to pass that security service into? Taxpayers again? You betchya.
I can’t say the fire dept is wrong in this. This is a commercial property. The owners are responsible for their property. If they allowed people to occupy it..then it’s on them. Did they file a complaint? Did they report the vagrants to police? I dont know. Police have a lot on their plate already with active complaint and calls… for all they know..if they hadn’t received a complaint from property owners those vagrants had their permission.
Place responsibly where it belongs. Commercial property owners are supposed to keep an eye on their own stuff.
Thank you for your inversion of reality and your victim-blaming, AFD.
I guess the insane woke mind-virus has infected even them.
Every one of those worthless stinking bums should have been arrested for arson.
Umm, OK, let’s look at this rationally, shall we?
The Municipal Fire Department advises that the owners of private property, after having boarded up their property, should hire security so as to monitor the accessibility, or lack thereof, of said property.
Fine. Let us see how that works.
A security employee finds that there are trespassers located within said property, and being unarmed, as most are, contact APD to vacate said trespassers from said property, which is done, and said trespassers are what, arrested, only to be let go minutes after a so-called hearing?
Such a waste of APD resources, no?
Let us go a step further.
The security agent is armed.
Then what?
Do they approach the trespassers armed to force them to vacate the area, when any number of them may be armed as well? Is the armed security going to shoot the trespassers? Is the trespasser going to shoot the armed security? And what is going to happen when APD responds?
Apparently, there are not enough ‘ahem’ funded hotel rooms for these trespassers so that they must ‘occupy’ a boarded off and vacant building, with the blessing of the current Assembly, of course.
So., I have a solution.
Apply a certain Municipal space, say the Woronzof complex in far west Northern Lights Blvd., or better yet, Fire Island, as the Coalition of Homelessness Compound of Housing.
This COHCOH would encompass ALL of Anchorages homeless population within a fenced and gated area so as to keep the non-homeless population out and provide services all provided by the Coalition of Homelessness employees and sub-contractors, who shall actually live within the complex.
Of course, the Queen of the COHCOH, Meg Zaletel, shall have her palace within the center of the COHCOH, where she will walk amongst the homeless daily, so as to touch them upon their foreheads within her grace, so as to give them nothing, whilst taking from them their possible monetary value, such as the monetary vampire that she is.
My actual solution?
‘Absolve and take away any and all Governmental controls and funding unto the supposed ‘Homelessness’ problem. Governmental involvement only creates a larger problem.
Are you kidding me? If the property owner allowed the hobos to live there for free, every social justice warrior in office would demand better, safer conditions be met.
Are you kidding me? Every taxpaying business owner in Anchorage should expect the police to investigate the appearance of a break and entry and report the investigation to the owner and on this case, having found several dozen trespassers of questionable living conditions, also report to social services?
I’m actually surprised that the Marxist Nine have not filed charges against the hotel owner (yet) for endangering the beloved and exalted homeless wretches.
Condemn the building, fine the owners so much they can’t afford, at least on paper, to keep it, give it to The Meg’s Coalition to End Homelessness, give The Meg’s Mob a few $M less a few $K in kickbacks to turn the heat on
.
…problem solved, no?
.
Or was that the strategy all slong?
YEs it is your repsonibilty as owner to secure the property. Absentee owners let them become hazards so they can collect insurance money. Tale as old as time
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