Ill. village may clean up cluttered house

SCHAUMBURG, Ill., July 27 (UPI) -- An Illinois man faces a court hearing next month to decide whether village workers may enter his home to clean up his cluttered property, officials said.

John Wuerffel, 62, of Schaumburg, near Chicago, has been living outdoors on his property, as health officials in October deemed his house uninhabitable due to unpaid utilities, the Arlington Heights (Ill.) Daily Herald reported Tuesday.

Schaumburg Public Health Officer Mary Passaglia said she hopes Wuerffel will use the remaining month to clean the property himself.

"The more we help, the more we enable him to live this way. It's unfair to the neighbors. It's unfair to the way we treat other residents," Passaglia said.

Wuerffel said he is a Vietnam veteran in poor health for the last 11 years. He said he is on medication for a heart condition and bipolar disorder, and that medical bills have caused him financial hardship.

Wuerffel said he owes $9,600 on his mortgage, in addition to the $1,400 to $1,500 he owes in utilities.

Wuerffel said he is trying to get a reverse mortgage that could allow him back into his house by September and a no-interest loan from the village for a new furnace.

But Passaglia and Wuerffel's reverse-mortgage adviser, Mark Newton of Perl Mortgage in Deerfield, said Wuerffel may not realize the good-faith cleanup effort he must show before getting these services.