JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — People living in one Murray Hill neighborhood are frustrated about piles of trash being left out on one property.
“It’s not appealing to the eyes at all,” Blake Louis, who lives in Murray Hill, said.
Louis has lived in Murray Hill for a few years now. He lives a few blocks over from the corner lot on Melba Street - a lot that he says has been covered with trash for years.
“It’s not too safe, though, with all this trash,” Louis said. “Pests that can be brought in … from all this trash overflow.”
There is no house on that lot. There is also no fence separating the property behind it, which is 620 Chestnut Street.
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Louis began filing complaints with the city of Jacksonville in 2024 for the address 620 Chestnut Street. His most recent complaint was this week.
Louis says that three months ago, a dumpster was placed out on the lot for the trash.
He says he saw the trash being pulled out of the house at 620 Chestnut Street and placed in the dumpster.
But in the last few weeks, he says that the dumpster – and just the dumpster - was picked up by someone, while the trash was left behind.
Robert Jeffers works across the street and watched the whole thing.
“We physically watched them dump the trash out of the dumpster back onto the lawn and leave,” Jeffers said.
Action News Jax went on the city of Jacksonville’s property appraiser website and found out that the address for the property where the trash was dumped is technically 617 Melba Street.
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We tried calling the owner of that lot, but we never heard back.
We also tried reaching out to who we thought was the owner of the house on Chestnut Street, but we had no luck there either.
We reached out to the city about this.
You can read their statement from the Municipal Code Compliance Division below:
“The Municipal Code Compliance Division has received several complaints regarding the property located at 620 Chestnut St., and only one complaint related to 617 Melba St. within the last two years. We only recently received a request in February of 2026 concerning 617 Melba St., which has not yet been released to a contractor, nor has the City placed any dumpsters on that vacant lot.
The property located at 620 Chestnut St. had been undergoing preparations for release to a site clearance contractor; however, that process was halted after the ownership changed and the property was placed under an estate following the original citation issued in 2025."
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Action News Jax also spoke with Councilman Jimmy Peluso, who represents this district.
He came out to the property and met with Action News Jax’s Madison Foglio. Councilman Peluso is on active duty with the U.S. Navy Reserves, so he couldn’t go on camera in uniform. But he did call Waste Management while we were there.
He called Action News Jax back and said that Waste Management told him that code compliance needs to cite the property owner, given that it’s private property … and give the property owner a chance to clean up the site.
As for Louis, he just wants the trash cleaned up.
“If it’s not cleaned up, I might be forced to move out,” said Louis.
Councilman Peluso says Code Enforcement told him they would be out there today.
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