OUR VIEW: An ugly eyesore for Old North End

It will be hard to fault Sally and Holger Christiansen if they choose to leave an eyesore in the Old North End Neighborhood.

Decapitation is well under way, as workers chisel and saw bricks and mortar to bring the once-beautiful brick wall at 1221 N. Cascade Ave. into compliance with city code. It will be ugly, but it will comply.

The act of bureaucratic, city-ordered vandalism will cost the Christiansens about $30,000. Or, it may cost them only $5,000. It all depends on how they choose to proceed. They can give the passersby and neighbors more beauty, or they can save their money and leave the community with a mangled mess.

Simply shaving the wall down a few inches, to satisfy city officials and a handful of people who made wall desecration a personal crusade, will cost only $5,000. At that juncture, the Christiansens will have complied with a city order. The wall will be considerably less attractive and the community will have to look at a structure that’s out of proportion and devoid of the decorative, rounded bricks lost to wall reduction.

The Christiansens also have the option of restoring the top of the wall with new decorative brick. To restore the wall to something approaching its original look, the project will cost roughly $30,000.

“We’re discussing not doing that, and just leaving it however it looks after it has been shaved down,” said Holger Christiansen. Why go the cheap route? Because the couple have run out of energy and enthusiasm for their wall and are weary of hemorrhaging money on something they thought they owned but clearly do not control. At this point, they claim to have spent roughly $300,000 building, defending and now decapitating the wall.

The Christiansens are hoping to get a variance from the city, along with approval from the historic board, to keep decorative pilasters that are part of the wall. They’re finding that working through the process may be a no-win. City planning officials have told them to see the historic board; the historic board has told them to see planning officials. Nothing is getting done. As it turns out, the city has no established variance process for pilasters, and merely saving them is beginning to feel a lot like the no-win process of preserving the integrity of the original wall.

It’s up to the Christiansens whether the North Cascade wall is something of beauty or the leftover eyesore that results from city-ordered uglification. An ugly wall might serve as just desserts for those who took joy in seeing the Christiansens ordered to shave down their wall.

The saddest part of the tale is the fact it was completely unnecessary. Once it was determined the Christiansens had violated process, by building their wall a bit too high without full permission, they could have been punished without mandatory wall desecration. The Christiansen’s offered to pay a substantial fine that could have been constructive to the community, rather than destructive and harmful.

The high estimate of wall decapitation and restoration is $30,000. Holger Christiansen said he would have paid a fine of $45,000, or $50,000, which the city could have used to renovate a playground or maintain the Uncle Wilber fountain in Acacia Park for several years.

Instead, the community gets a vengeful and destructive punishment, with no economic value whatsoever, which will create an eyesore for the Old North End Neighborhood.

Opponents of a fine said it would allow rich people to get around the city code. What they may not understand is the fact these “rich people” paid their dues. Holger Christiansen came to this country as a dirt poor immigrant from Denmark. He began working in seventh grade, paid his way through two universities, and began creating wealth as an architect. Sally Christiansen works in real estate. They earned money the hard way. Making them part with it, to pay a hefty fine, would have punished them nicely. Instead, they may pay just $5,000 to leave the community with one ugly, vandalized eyesore of bricks.

Who could blame them? — Wayne Laugesen, editorial page editor, for the editorial board

—

Editorial opinions have no connection with The Gazette’s news division, and do not express the views of all Gazette associates.