NEW IBERIA, La. (KLFY)- A New Iberia resident said she was sleeping in her home on Reynolds Street in New Iberia last year when she saw a bright orange light coming from outside her bedroom window.

“When I saw the house on fire, I said, ‘my God,'” a woman said, pointing to a blighted house across the street from her home.

“About two or three o’clock in the morning there was a fire. I guess it was in the kitchen area because it spread first towards the patio and the car. Then it moved towards the front of the house,” she said.

Luckily, no one was hurt, the resident said. It’s been a year, however, and she says the empty, burned house has been vacant since the fire.

Neighbors say it’s become a nuisance and a safety hazard in the neighborhood, so the city stepped in to help.

“Burned houses are a hazard. Some of these burned houses are still here after five years. Drug use, prostitution, everything is going on in these houses,” New Iberia City Councilman David Broussard told News 10.

Broussard said the home is only one of many blighted properties the city plans to demolish in an effort to make the city safer and more welcoming.

New Iberia Mayor Freddie DeCourt says he’s identified over 500 blighted, vacant buildings in the city.

He plans to demolish the buildings that are a safety hazard and restore the buildings that pass inspection.

“Our ultimate goal is to save as many as we can to get them back into commerce. Get them back into ownership so someone is living there,” Mayor DeCourt said.