\n\t\t\t\t\t\tMillvale Borough officials are in search of a way to demolish a dilapidated townhome attached to other units. Faith Skryp lives in a rowhouse on Evergreen Avenue in Millvale, with her husband and granddaughter. She has called the rental unit home for 14 years. Skryp said the unit next to her at 1133 Evergreen Avenue has been abandoned for as long as she\u2019s lived there. In the last three years, she has seen and heard conditions get worse. “Oh, I hear it all the time \u2013 things just falling over there, and I have told them about that,\u201d Skryp told Pittsburgh\u2019s Action News 4 Reporter Jordan Cioppa. \u201cI’m scared, you know. I’m afraid, you know, and I have nowhere to go.”A large section of the end unit is falling apart. The dilapidation is visible from behind the property on North Avenue. According to borough officials, each of the units is separately owned. Outside of safety concerns, Skryp and her family have been dealing with even more problems. \u201cNothing\u2019s getting done. Nothing. I’ve been putting up with rats, bugs. I had no water for Christmas time because the pipes froze, and they were also coming from over there because we were on a party line,\u201d Skryp said. Seth Abrams, the borough manager of Millvale, said the owner of the unit was still responsible for the property, but had not been responsive. \u201cIt\u2019s an eyesore,\u201d Abrams said. “It invites criminals, it invites rodents, it invites problems.\u201dIn 2024, Abrams said the borough was tentatively granted funding to demolish that portion of the rowhouse through Allegheny County\u2019s Act 152 Blight Removal Program. “When we ran into the issues that the structure was attached with one common wall with a solid roof across all the structures, it skyrocketed the estimated cost and also came with additional legal implications,\u201d Abrams said. According to the borough manager, the project was estimated to cost about $160,000 to 180,000. In 2025, the county and borough agreed demolition was not feasible, especially since the residents in the neighboring unit would most likely need to vacate during demolition, Abrams said. \u201cThat would be fine. I would have arrangements for that. I’ve already made arrangements for that,\u201d Skryp said. While she\u2019s OK with leaving temporarily, Skryp said she is hoping for a solution that allows her to stay in her home long term. “I really don’t want to have to move completely,\u201d Skryp said.Abrams said they are looking to get an updated cost estimate, while also exploring their legal options. Pittsburgh\u2019s Action News 4 could not find contact information for the owner.\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\tMILLVALE, Pa. \u2014 \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
Millvale Borough officials are in search of a way to demolish a dilapidated townhome attached to other units. <\/p>\n
Faith Skryp lives in a rowhouse on Evergreen Avenue in Millvale, with her husband and granddaughter. She has called the rental unit home for 14 years. <\/p>\n
Skryp said the unit next to her at 1133 Evergreen Avenue has been abandoned for as long as she\u2019s lived there. In the last three years, she has seen and heard conditions get worse. <\/p>\n
“Oh, I hear it all the time \u2013 things just falling over there, and I have told them about that,\u201d Skryp told Pittsburgh\u2019s Action News 4 Reporter Jordan Cioppa. \u201cI’m scared, you know. I’m afraid, you know, and I have nowhere to go.”<\/p>\n
A large section of the end unit is falling apart. The dilapidation is visible from behind the property on North Avenue. <\/p>\n
According to borough officials, each of the units is separately owned. <\/p>\n
Outside of safety concerns, Skryp and her family have been dealing with even more problems. <\/p>\n
\u201cNothing\u2019s getting done. Nothing. I’ve been putting up with rats, bugs. I had no water for Christmas time because the pipes froze, and they were also coming from over there because we were on a party line,\u201d Skryp said. <\/p>\n
Seth Abrams, the borough manager of Millvale, said the owner of the unit was still responsible for the property, but had not been responsive. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s an eyesore,\u201d Abrams said. “It invites criminals, it invites rodents, it invites problems.\u201d<\/p>\n
In 2024, Abrams said the borough was tentatively granted funding to demolish that portion of the rowhouse through Allegheny County\u2019s Act 152 Blight Removal Program. <\/p>\n
“When we ran into the issues that the structure was attached with one common wall with a solid roof across all the structures, it skyrocketed the estimated cost and also came with additional legal implications,\u201d Abrams said. <\/p>\n
According to the borough manager, the project was estimated to cost about $160,000 to 180,000.<\/p>\n
In 2025, the county and borough agreed demolition was not feasible, especially since the residents in the neighboring unit would most likely need to vacate during demolition, Abrams said. <\/p>\n
\u201cThat would be fine. I would have arrangements for that. I’ve already made arrangements for that,\u201d Skryp said. <\/p>\n
While she\u2019s OK with leaving temporarily, Skryp said she is hoping for a solution that allows her to stay in her home long term. <\/p>\n
“I really don’t want to have to move completely,\u201d Skryp said.<\/p>\n
Abrams said they are looking to get an updated cost estimate, while also exploring their legal options. <\/p>\n
Pittsburgh\u2019s Action News 4 could not find contact information for the owner. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Millvale Borough officials are in search of a way to demolish a dilapidated townhome attached to other units.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":214306,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[900,894,82014,40777,56290,93898,8833,93901,73,75,74,93900,75214,93899,1880,526,11835],"class_list":["post-214305","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pittsburgh","tag-action-news","tag-allegheny-county","tag-borough-manager","tag-demolition","tag-dilapidated-property","tag-faith-skryp","tag-millvale","tag-millvale-borough-official","tag-pittsburgh","tag-pittsburgh-headlines","tag-pittsburgh-news","tag-rowhouse","tag-safety-concern","tag-seth-abrams","tag-structure","tag-time","tag-unit"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214305","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=214305"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214305\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/214306"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=214305"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=214305"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=214305"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}