Home owner in rural portion of county is living in horrid conditions with dilapidated house filled with roaches, rodents etc...he is living there with his wife and a teenage son...the neighbors have complained about the odor and vermin spillover.
My thoughts are:
A: adult protective services
B: CPS
C: nuisance abatement letter under 343 H&S code....
does anyone have any other suggestions of a route we might take?
As far as I know, our county has never adopted abatement procedures under 343.021 that seems to authorize local abatement rules and procedures.
Owner obviously has no money, so I'm not sure the "fine only" criminal penalties will have much impact.
Any one else have any ideas?

Health department may have some stroke as well because of the vermin.

I'm thinking that, with the family being basically destitute, you are looking at state agency intervention. That would be APS (if an adult is arguably not competent), CPS (presuming that the teenager is under 17) or Health Department -- and they don't care what the ages / conditions of the inhabitants might be.

I'm a little surprised that the school has not contacted CPS over the child; are they home schooling?

The local health department is looking at it....however, best I can tell, they can send notice etc and if the homeowner refuses then the complaint goes to the county atty for filing of an abatement, injunction etc....the family, no doubt, has no money and it will fall to the county to clean the mess, including disposing of 5 deteriorated trailers, including the one that is being occupied as the primary home. I have not been able to find any authority for the county to go in and remove the debris which would include the "home" and mounds of accumulated trash, especially without a local ordinance or set of guidelines from the county...
If this were just trash piled on property, I tend to think we could remove and assess against the property if the owner refused to clean property.
My concern is that this is an occupied homestead and that we will not get voluntary compliance from the owners....several junked cars along with the 5 mobile homes...it will be expensive to abate, even for the county . I went to look at it first hand today and was shocked....CPS or APS may be the way to go....just not sure

If any of this is in the right of way, the commissioners can remove it. If the health unit certifies a public health issue, the county can act and there may be some state funds for help, I don't know.