Vacant hospital creating problems for New Kensington community

NEW KENSINGTON, Pa. — The City Clerk said New Kensington has had enough of a vacant hospital in town.

It used to house Citizens General Hospital, but now sits empty without power or running water. Now, the city is working to make sure the owner is held accountable.

“It’s not fair to the people that live here, and it is a very high-traffic location,” said New Kensington City Clerk John Zavadak.

Drone 11 shows the massive five-and-a-half-acre building that used to house Citizens General Hospital until the year 2000. After that, the building was leased by AHN for quick service operations like X-rays and blood work. But three years ago, the building was sold to Resolution Property LLC, based in California, for $1.5 million. The city clerk says it’s been an issue ever since.

“Every time we send officers down here, it costs us money. And it’s not one or two; we send three or four officers,” said Zavadak. “Then they had to go in and try to clear the building if the building is open, and that’s very dangerous because that place is like a maze.”

Broken windows, boarded doors and weeds now cover the building. Recently, eight people were arrested for stealing more than $200,000 worth of copper from the building.

“They had been in the building probably for weeks and the reason they got caught was because they brought a U-Haul truck to take the copper away,” said Zavadak

“Every time they try to break in and break windows, we come down and secure it and bolt it shut,” said Christian Lecocq, the city’s code enforcement officer. “So we are just trying to make it less attractive for them to come down and do something.”

The city has now started issuing citations to the owner, one every 5 days at 1,000 dollars a citation. So far they’ve issued at least 25, but the owner has only responded once in person.

Lecocq said, “He was here for a day, did about 10 percent of what he said he was going to do and he hasn’t been back since.”

“They are now about 1.8 million dollars a year in taxes, and they’ve done absolutely nothing to the building,” said Zavadak

According to city officials, the owners have yet to pay any of the fines. Channel 11 reached out to the LLC but did not receive a response.

Zavadak said the city’s hands are tied, but they will continue to build a case against the owner. He says he could see the issue going to the state.

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