Broken Arrow's 'Operation Community Pride'

Folks in Broken Arrow are fighting to keep their neighborhoods clean with the help of the city's police department. <br/><br/>It's called "Operation Community Pride." News on 6 reporter Patrina

Thursday, June 10th 2004, 5:15 pm

By: News On 6

Folks in Broken Arrow are fighting to keep their neighborhoods clean with the help of the city's police department.

It's called "Operation Community Pride." News on 6 reporter Patrina Adger says Chad Burden is one of the Broken Arrow Police officers involved with Operation Community Pride, a project initiated by the department four years ago which focuses on cleaning up city neighborhoods.

Residents at the Melinda Park Addition are fed up with the visible eyesores in their community and have asked police to step in and help. "'It's a nice neighborhood, lots of nice folks who live there, but there are people who don't care for their property as much as the other folks."

As soon as you drive into the neighborhood you notice right away a number of public nuisances, like un-kept yards. "See how he has wood piled up there, which can be considered a health and safety hazard." Improper storage of boats and inoperable cars in yards, all of which residents say diminishes their property value and makes their neighborhood look ugly.

Officer Burden patrols the area regularly, so if he notices a violation, many times he will address the owner right away, like he did with one man. "Your car is a violation. Others have their property red-tagged. â€œThose who have their property red-tagged are given instructions on how to correct the problem and a reasonable amount of time to fix it." Burden says for the most part residents just aren't aware of the problem and fix it right away. Others just tear off the red sticker hoping the problem will go away, but your car tag information goes into a database and if the problem isn't corrected, you could be given a citation. But Burden says police don't want to do that.

The idea is to help beautify this Broken Arrow community and with the community's help, Burden says it can be done.

If you know of any nuisance violation within the Broken Arrow city limits, you can report it to the police department at 259-8400, ask for mailbox number 68.