Omaha Housing Division looks to clean up the city, starting with junk cars

The Omaha Housing Division is taking strides to beautify the city.

They've hired an inspector to handle nuisance complaints on private properties.

One of the newly hired violation and nuisance inspector's job is handling complaints about junk cars littering people's yards.

Joshua Polan works on Fowler Ave. and sees this problem first hand.

"It's kind of an eyesore, yeah for sure," Polan said.

Recently a house on this street had their so-called "car litter" cluttering the yard taken away.

"At least 10. I mean eight...eight on the street and whatever is in the yard," Polan went on.

It's not just those cars, two other cars at two different homes in the past month have also been towed away.

According to several affidavits, the cars couldn't run, weren't registered and weren't parked on paved surfaces.

"It's like a relief really," Polan expressed. "You know the city finally did something about it."

Scott Lane, Omaha's chief housing inspector, saw a growing need to handle complaints about these junk cars.

"These cases were kind of falling under the radar a little bit," Lane said.

Lane got the go-ahead from the city to hire a new inspector and is thrilled with how it's going.

"Now that Gary is in this position, we are 10 fold with the cases that are being cleared," Lane said.

Gary Jacobsen started the position two months ago, he makes sure the complaints they received are valid and then takes the necessary steps to get them taken care of.

"In a lot of cases they've been dealing with this junk or debris on the neighboring property for a long time -- so when they see action, that makes them very happy," Jacobsen said.

Both Lane and Jacobsen hope to grow this position in the future because they are aware of how great of a need it is in the city.

If there is a junk car in your neighborhood you think Jacobsen needs to look at, you can call the mayor's hotline, go online to enforce Omaha or call city planning.

Lane made it clear this new inspectors position only handles cars on private property, cars in the street will still be handled by OPD and public works.