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Police Looking Into Increased Crime At Laurelton
By Catherine Galioto
Laurelton Mobile Home Park continues to struggle with quality of life issues, according to residents there.
But instead of lack of improved facilities, the issue is now one of crime.
Residents in the park and the adjacent development are fearful for their lives, they said. Burglaries, drug use, assault and gun possession are among the recent crimes reported in the area.
The mobile home park, which is now an over 55 age-restricted community, needs both better code enforcement and police presence, its residents reported. Many came forward and claimed their neighbor's doors were kicked in, or that they had witnessed heroin use and assaults upon the elderly.
"It sounds to me like there is a police problem in there," Mayor Dan Kelly said. "I will find out about it…I am not satisfied about it."
Kelly had a meeting with Laurelton residents this summer to discuss the issues they continued to face, some of them were complaints that have stretched over years. Kelly said he had another meeting last week to further investigate the issue.
Burglaries are plaguing the park, residents claim, and now crime is spilling into the Laurelton Heights development.
"We've traced back the burglaries to the mobile home park," Township Council President Stephen Acropolis confirmed. "The police are going through there, and made an arrest."
Residents are requesting a police presence, a police car on site instead of patrols.
The township took steps to improve the quality of life in the mobile home park last winter, passing a series of ordinances that: mandate an on-site manager at the park; limit residency to those 55 years and older; forbidding park managers from moving trailers without permission, among other measures.
But residents said none of those ordinances are being enforced properly.
"I hope our guys are going out there every single day," Acropolis said, urging the administration to send code enforcement out to the park daily.
Another issue is crowding. If there are mobile home with four or five people living in them, that is in violation of the township's ordinance on overcrowding, which was passed last year.
"That's a big, big problem," Acropolis said. "Go out and do heck of a lot more than we're currently going … I think it's an enforcement issue."
On the whole, residents are not getting the protection they require, he said.
"Brick Township is not going to become a slum," Acropolis said at last week's council meeting, to audience applause. "If the ordinance doesn't get enforced, nothing happens. We're frustrated."
After the heated comments last week, Kelly said he, administration and the police department went out the following day and spent half the day researching the situation on-site.
"Bottom line, there are problems there, obviously," Kelly said. "Some people have a legitimate fear. We're going to have an ongoing investigation."
He hopes to have the building department, code enforcement, police and township administrator all looking into the situation.
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