Because that's the best time to burn it down for the insurance money with minimal human cost. My point is its not a business, it doesn't have to make money and

Because that's the best time to burn it down for the insurance money with minimal human cost. My point is its not a business, it doesn't have to make money and if it was held up to the standards of a commercial enterprise you'd have no better solution then to burn it down. This is in response to OP's idea that you need to fulfil some kind of service requirement, or even run an effective service at all.