1260 Sargeant Street

Property address:  1260 Sargeant Street, Baltimore, MD 21223

Property owner:  1260 Sargeant Street, LLC, 17 Warren Road, Suite 18, Baltimore, MD 21208

Registered agent for 1260 Sargeant Street, LLC:  Jack Novograd, 5616 Park Heights Avenue, Baltimore, MD 21215

City Council District and Contact: 9th District, Agnes Welch

Poor Sargeant Street, you do seem to have more than your fair share of slumlord-owned properties, and this one is no exception.  This house (along with the two on either side of it) caught fire in July of 2008.  The fire was so hot that the siding on a few of the houses across the alley melted right off.  Homeless people were using the house, as were drug addicts and others, for illegal activities.  In fact, we used this house as inspiration for our essay on Broken Window Syndrome.  Calls to the city resulted in no action, and finally we ended up with this:

The houses on either side of this mess have been repaired, or are in the process of being repaired.  We don’t hold out much hope for poor 1260, because of the owner.  If you recall, Jack Novograd is also the registered agent for the corporation that owns 1003 S. Carey Street, another blighted Washington Village property, just around the corner from Sargeant Street.  In fact, after doing some checking, we found that Jack Novograd has ties to Stanley Rochkind, one of Baltimore’s most notorious slumlords.  In June of 2001, Rochkind was ordered to perform lead hazard reduction treatments in almost 500 properties around Baltimore City.  All of these properties were owned by the 80+ companies in which Rochkind holds a controlling interest.  We are currently looking into Mr. Rochkind and Mr. Novograd and their current business activities, and will be writing a followup post on these two.  Their blatant disregard for the health and safety of their tenants, and the people in the surrounding communities is shocking, to say the least.  Stay tuned for more.