Landlord promises cooperation with city

Less than a day after he voiced concern about a landlord’s willingness to assist in the cleanup of North Commerce Avenue in Waynesboro, Councilman Mike Harris got what he wanted.

Bobby Jardine, the owner of the apartment complexes at 260 and 280 N. Commerce Avenue, said Friday he plans to allow the city to bring drug-sniffing dogs through the halls of his buildings.

Jardine said his seeming reluctance to warm up to the idea stemmed from a combination of wanting to talk to his attorney and to keep his doors from getting “busted down” by police.

“I don’t condone criminal activity at anytime,” he said. “We are all working together, and we are more so than seems to be conveyed.”

Jardine said he’s met twice with police Chief Doug Davis and helped assist detectives in their investigations of the killings of two men who’d once lived at 260 N. Commerce.

In the last 18 months, the Waynesboro Police Department has spent $80,000 in call responses to North Commerce, criminal investigations and increased patrols, police said. The two killings with a North Commerce connection happened over a five-week span between May and June.

During those two months, police increased their presence on North Commerce, and calls there decreased by 13 percent, coinciding with increased foot patrols, police said.

Jardine said he’s been there, willing to help anytime something violent happens.

“I get calls at three in the morning because someone got shot in the foot,” he said.

Pleased with Jardine’s change in plans, Harris said he felt optimistic about the effort to chase crime from the street.

“I think he’s going to be more receptive to what our needs are to fix the problem,” Harris said of Jardine. “I would certainly think that we’re going to solve the problem rather fastly now.”

The councilman said he believes the increased police presence and efforts targeting drugs will diminish the problems plaguing the apartment
complexes.

“There’s always more to do after that,” Harris said. “We want to make sure that it doesn’t occur again and that it doesn’t come back.”

Jardine said he has set goals for the building, and that most of the problems come from visitors to the building, not his tenants. Police said that assessment is correct.

“My whole plan has been to get a better group of tenants in there, and I really feel that has happened,” Jardine said. “I’ve got some good people there. It has been a hindrance to keeping that plan in motion when I’ve got outsiders coming in causing situations of violence. It makes it tough for the tenants I have.”