Two signs:
STOP HOARDING HOUSING! Live in it, rent it out … or sell it to someone who will!
STOP HOARDING LAND! Open it to public use! ReWild it! Stop mowing empty lots.
My new project. I painted signs on both sides of an old piece of plywood (that I had been using for a block party sign some years back). Now I’m putting the sign temporarily in front of various offending properties in my neighborhood, and taking photos. One of the biggest house hoarders conveniently left a sign-hangable post on their property even after the for sale sign was removed. This place is now bank owned (oh yippee — so we go from a local househoarder to a national or global househoarder). [crying and horror emojis]
I’m just hoping to raise awareness and get more people questioning our concept of what property rights are. Maybe they need to evolve. I’m tired of nobody questioning that all someone has to do is keep the lawn mowed, and pay taxes (If they are even paying their property taxes), and that’s all they owe the community. But let someone try to squat there and everyone will be on it like a sonnet.
PS. These vacant properties actually tend to be excessively mowed. Could be native duneflower meadow or scrub or even trees, but it gets mowed constantly so it doesn’t even serve the basic default natural functions of heat mitigation, stormwater absorption, erosion control, pollinator habitat, biodiversity. I have seen lawn crews literally mowing sand.[Angry emoji with mouth taped shut by cuss words]
And, In response to a fellow citizen who commented that she fully supports my efforts, but pointed out that there are county statutes against putting a sign on someone else’s property. And also that, even absent a statute, lawyers just could have a field day with it:
Thank you. And to be clear, all I do is prop up the sign for 30 seconds on a vacant lot or vacant building, so I can take a picture of it. Then I take away the sign. It’s designed to be portable and reusable.
Also, I totally encourage everyone to make their own physical or electronic versions of these signs! If electronic, it’s easy to paste them onto their favorite images of their own neighborhood vacant properties that are creating “rich blight.” And the photos can be taken from the public sidewalk, and then the image can just be electronically pasted on to the photo. In other words there is no need to even go onto a property at all.
The image with sign pasted on can then be posted on social media, shared with local neighborhood groups and local government etc.
I don’t know if I’m the first one who coined the term “rich blight”, but I did mention it in a 5-minute speech I gave back in 2015 called “filling our empty spaces”. It was for the first Daytona Elevate, a mini TED talk type event.)
Further exploration:
• Theaster Gates, Chicago, Black Cinema (Mr. Gates, an African-American potter and activist, was a great source of inspiration for my talk).
• “Filling our empty spaces,” talk by jenny nazak, 2015 on the Elevate YouTube channel.
• Vacancy taxes are a thing in many cities now. I believe strong towns even has some articles mentioning them.