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Harrisburg city council discusses sinkhole study

People who live along the sinkhole-plagued South 14th street in Harrisburg still don’t have answers when it comes to what will happen to their homes. Harr...
sinkhole

People who live along the sinkhole-plagued South 14th street in Harrisburg still don’t have answers when it comes to what will happen to their homes. Harrisburg’s city engineer updated council members on the city’s studies Wednesday evening. South 14th street remains closed with loose gravel laid on top. The city plans to pave the street to stop water from entering and as a temporary fix so it’s not an eyesore to residents. But that doesn’t mean cars will be able to drive over it.

City council members still don’t know how much the street and surrounding areas will cost to fix or how exactly it plans to fix the sinkhole problem. 11 homes on South 14 Street are labeled as placard. That means they’re deemed not fit for people to live in, although some people remain in their homes at their own risk. City council says fixing their homes is up to property owners at this point. But many questions as to what will happen still remain.

“Is that going to determine in 4 weeks whether or not we’re going to raise houses, whether or not houses are going to be lost, whether or not houses are going to be kept, we don’t know. There’s no way to know,” says council member and public works chairperson, Sandra Reid.

Also at the meeting it announced that law students and volunteer lawyers will be available to homeowners. Council member Sandra Reid’s advice to homeowners is to take advantage of that. FOX43 also spoke with a woman who lives on the street. Her home is safe to live in but she says she’s sick of waiting for the city to figure out what to do.

“It’s really not safe out here at all.. like the ground is uneven out here… like it sinks in,” says Janaysia.

City council expects to know exactly how much it will cost the city to fix the street in 4 weeks. For now people on this street are crossing their fingers the problem doesn’t get any worse.

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