The long saga of 1901 Maryland Ave. East took another strange turn on Wednesday, Jan. 16, when the St. Paul City Council heard the former homeowner’s appeal of a $12,000 demolition assessment. The house, which was declared a nuisance property and unlivable by the city’s Department of Safety and Inspections, has been torn down, and property owner Michael Ahrndt, of Scandia, has been left to foot the demolition bill.
Robert Humphrey, a spokesman for the Department of Safety and Inspections, said in an interview that the single-story house was structurally unsound and it generated frequent complaints from neighbors, who considered it a dangerous eyesore. Records show Ahrndt bought the property in August 1999 for $47,500.
On Wednesday, Ahrndt appealed the $12,000 assessment to the city council, without success. There were plenty of fireworks coming from Ahrndt, but the most fiery of them emerged at the end of his testimony, right before he left a kind of verbal condemnation on the city council in the native Dakota language.
His lengthy testimony is recorded on video, and listed under Item No. 42 on the City Council agenda.
Ahrndt told the council, “My answer here, this matter is now turned over to divine judgment. God’s way shall rule, and I believe you shall, for the sake of your souls, council, come to see that God’s thoughts are higher than your thoughts, and God’s ways are higher than your ways. The great spirit is absolute. So people of St. Paul, hear me well. Awaken to what takes place right here before you. There is a great transformation underway. The wicked shall find no sanctuary. There shall be restitution. Reconciliation is near. The city of St. Paul, as you discover yourself under siege of the greatest of all powers, repent, I suggest. … Behold the power of God, lesser council. … I believe this self-serving behavior to be unforgivable. But that shall be your eternal business with God.”
Then came the condemnation in Dakota.
Ahrndt also asked the council members to resign immediately, and said “hundreds and perhaps even thousands of the extremely poor, completely despaired young children” would be deprived of his services by the tear-down.
He started his appeal on more technical footing. Ahrndt said “this ludicrous, preposterous, completely absurd assessment brought against myself, my family, my ministry and those I care-give to, this fiendish surtax with its egotistical motives” was three times the size of demolition estimates he received for the tear-down from licensed contractors.
He also said his “nonprofit foundation” purchased the small house more than a decade ago for care-giving and youth services. Green space associated with the Furness Parkway project directly abuts his house, and Ahrndt claims the road’s proximity made his house “unmarketable.”
Kaitlyn Egan, news editor at the weekly East Side Review, delved into the ins and outs of Ahrndt’s long-running battle with City Hall in April 2012, and it’s worth a read, here.