As violence and crime continue along 11th Street in Sioux Falls, the city is following through with plans to clean up the run-down neighborhood.

Mayor Dave Munson took a late night tour of the area over the weekend, and said he's committed to using the necessary resources to get it cleaned-up. City workers are in the process of canvassing the area around 11th Street issuing citations for code violations. Several city departments are coordinating their efforts to crack down on the unsightly properties. 

“In some cases we'll be going back to properties two or three times to make sure it gets taken care of, and if not, we'll turn it over to the city attorney's office,” said Mike Cooper, director of Planning and Building Services in Sioux Falls. 

Cooper says the city will be focusing its efforts on cleaning up properties overgrown with weeds, homes or businesses that have abandoned vehicles on their property, garbage or large appliances no longer being used on their property and other unsightly violations. 

“We're looking for property maintenance and building code issues, and we're doing that through building services and through code enforcement officials,” Cooper said. 

And once the city gets existing properties around 11th Street up to code, they'll fan out their efforts. 

“And then we'll go into phase two, looking up to 9th Street and south to 16th Street and look at those properties as well,” he said. 

The last phase of the city's efforts will be to look at possibly removing older, run-down buildings to make way for new ones. 

“It is a very comprehensive project that were undertaking of course ultimately the mayor wants us to go in to look at the redevelopment of property,” Cooper said. 

It’s a goal that could turn around a neighborhood in need. Cooper says the city was hoping to release statistics today about their progress. But he says there are so many problems, its going to take an extra week to put all of that information together.