What’s going on with these abandoned mobile homes?

Two weeks ago, a series of abandoned mobile homes appeared on private property, rural county roads and pastures up and down the vast Weld County landscape.

And the sheriff’s office says there could be more out there.

So what’s the deal? Weld County officials say a man dumped these trailers all over the county over the past two weeks to avoid a code violation. Authorities so far have found seven mobile homes, including one just across the Wyoming border. Most were discovered in northeast

Weld County, near Briggsdale and Hereford.

The man, who has not been publicly identified, has been “somewhat cooperative” in helping county workers remove three of the trailers so far, said Joe Moylan, a Weld County sheriff’s spokesman.

The man has not been charged with a crime, Moylan said, and the case is being worked as a civil matter.

At first, the man decided he didn’t want the trailers, so he started storing them on someone else’s abandoned property, Moylan said. When the property owners decided they didn’t want them on their land, the man had to move them.

“His resolution was just to dump them,” Moylan said.

The problem with these trailers is that they were built before 1976 and aren’t up to modern housing codes, so the county cannot issue permits for them, said Tom Parko, Weld County’s director of planning services.

“They can’t even be in the county,” he said.

The sheriff’s office has asked the public to report any additional sightings of abandoned trailers by calling non-emergency dispatch at 970-350-9600, prompt 4.