Among the slate of speakers at the regular meeting of the Port Arthur City Council on Tuesday night two of the speakers were concerned about the cleanliness and appearance of the city.

Attorney Carl Parker spoke first about the city’s code enforcement.

He said the city should be concerned about protecting property values and the city’s cleanliness. He gave an example of his neighbor who has a roofing company, hoarding pickup trucks and his workers in his house. He was using the house as his office and it took Parker two years of complaining to the city attorney’s office to have him cited last week. Even though he was cited, Parker said his neighbor still has trucks at his house.

“If you can’t tell he’s running a business you’re either blind, deaf or mute,” he said. “This diminishes the value of properties and tax values. We need more interest in cleaning the city up.”

Parker said there are code violations all over the city. While the city is spending $1 million a year to mow other people’s grass, the city doesn’t cite residents or the city court doesn’t make them want to come again to court.

On the other hand, the city of Galveston doesn’t have code violations such as broken down vehicles at homes because of their code enforcement.

Mayor Derrick Freeman said the city started giving failure to appear in city court citations and they have become more stringent.

Enoc Briones lives on Lewis Drive and he also wanted to talk about keeping the city orderly.

He moved to Port Arthur in 1990 and liked it. He raised his family here. Lately, however, he’s been seeing a multitude of homeless people, particularly since Tropical Storm Harvey, walking down the street, pushing shopping carts.

He added that there are many homeless people under the covered parking lot at Howard’s Grocery Store at Lewis and Ninth Avenue.

Furthermore, someone broke into his garage two weeks ago and a neighbor had her car broken into.

Freeman said homeless residents aren’t suppose to return to the covered parking lot once they leave.

He added that the lone homeless shelter in the city, Port Cities Rescue Mission, is down and another one is desperately needed.

The former Al Price Texas Youth Commission facility on Highway 69 in Beaumont will soon reopen as the Dream Center. Freeman said Dream Center is based in Los Angeles and they do “tremendous work” among the homeless there.

“I hope it’s a place where they can heal, live and get back on their feet,” he said.