Dear Editor,
I have to say that I am impressed with the current pictures of the kudos and eyesores around the Town of Van Horn.
Hopefully you will continue with these pictures of the good, the bad, and yes, the ugly. It seems that many people in the area just take them for granted. They are what they are and nothing can be done about it.
Being from a much larger town then Van Horn, I was always impressed with the ordinances that kept our town looking good.
Ordinances that covered types, size and colors of signs, landscaping in the fronts of businesses, destruction and removal of unsightly buildings, removal of abandoned vehicles and the list went on and on.
Agreed, sometime they seemed excessive, but the town thrived, and new people were moving in all the time. It was always a pleasure to drive down the main drags and see all the great-looking buildings and businesses.
Now, I understand that the amount of new business in Van Horn is limited, but having the main roads going through and out of Van Horn needing improvements is not helping the Town’s appeal.
I also understand that not everyone has enough capital to make their property into the Taj Mahal, but that doesn’t mean it has to look like a junkyard either.
For those of us who live out on Hwy. 90 and have to pass the torn-apart mobile home with the couches sticking out the side or the junk yards where everything is visible from the street, isn’t it about time that the Town of Van Horn insist that these properties be cleaned up?
After all what is the sense of having the Kudos when right next door is the Eyesores and nothing is being done to change it.
There are many beautiful areas in Van Horn, but dotted through them are the properties that are sitting in rubble, just a place for vagrants and vermin to live and breed.
And speaking about vagrants, what’s with the ones hanging around the Pilot and sleeping down in the drainage ditch, as well as sitting by the viaduct with signs asking for donations for one problem or another. Isn’t this another area that needs to be cleaned up?
Yes, we are new to town and I know that Rome wasn’t built in a day, but it has to start somewhere. My suggestions are to benefit Van Horn, to make it a place that people can proudly say: I live in Van Horn not why would you ever move there?
I am not on any boards or any type of trustee in Van Horn, but I know that these people read this paper and hopefully they will start to open their eyes to all the eyesores that make Van Horn a less than desirable place to call home.
What Van Horn needs is more Kudos and a lot less Eyesores. Keep up the good work, Advocate, on showing the politicians in this Town the problems that really need to be addressed.
Respectfully,
Penney Wilson
