The Properties Lawton Has Officially Listed As ‘Dangerous’

If you drive around enough in Lawton, surely you've spotted some of the vacant and most run-down homes and old businesses and wondered "Why doesn't someone do something about this?" Rest assured, someone is doing something about some of these properties now.

The City of Lawton has what they call their Dilapidated & Dangerous List. If a property fits the description as a public nuisance, they end up on this list. You can watch the full March 15th council meeting about it below, but I must warn you, even in the realm of city council meetings, this one is rather dull and extremely boring.

Once listed, the city gives the property owner thirty days to pull the permits to either fix the property or tear it down. If they refuse, the city steps in and takes care of it for them with additional legal recourse that no property owner wants to experience.

The purpose of this isn't only to beautify the town, it's really to address other problems. A vacant house being lived in by squatters, drug-users, becoming a meth-den, cook-house, and let's admit it, what kid doesn't like the thrill of exploring a run-down house?

So what will land your property on the Lawton D&D list? Any one of dozens of reasons can be debated until we're all blue in the face. Instead of describing reasons, we can learn by example by looking at the most recently included properties.