Thursday, November 22, 2007

CM PRESS # 243


VACANT PROPERTIES AND INEFFECTIVE MUNICIPAL CODES



We're starting to have a problem in Costa Mesa with boarded up properties that seem to have permanent "temporary" fences around them. Some stay in this state for years.

The intent of such fencing is to keep the properties from being eyesores and to keep them from being used for illicit purposes while demolition and construction activities take place behind the fences.

Unfortunately, some of these fences just seem to barely mask the boarded up property and end up being part of the problem, not part of the solution--because some remain in place for so long.

The way our municipal code is presently written, the City has painted itself into a corner with these fences and boarded up properties. In fact, it's an example of the expression: be careful what you ask for.

As it is right now, if the City asks a property owner to board up a property and put up a fence, and if the owner complies, the City then ends up with both a boarded up property and an ugly fence and thereafter has a difficult time naming the boarded up property a public nuisance; because the owner has complied with what the City asked him to do.

When citizens have complained about long term boarded up and fenced properties, City Council members usually reply that there's nothing they can do about the problem.

Nothing they can do? Nonsense. They're the lawmakers in this city. If the law doesn't work, then revise it.

And, revise it they should.

The problem with our codes is even worse than I alluded to above. They have loopholes big enough for an army of homeless people pushing shopping carts 20 abreast to go through. And, don't think that may not be happening to some degree in some of these boarded up and fenced properties.

So, at Tuesday's City Council meeting, the CM PRESS suggested to the Council that they may wish to consider changing our codes regarding vacant properties and public nuisances to include, at a minimum, the following provisions that are now missing:

1. Add a catchall preamble giving the policy reasons for these codes.

2. Add a time limit on keeping a property boarded up or fenced.

3. Require that a property owner prominently post his contact information on the property.

4. Charge owners for the extra enforcement that their boarded up properties require if they remain boarded up past a fair and reasonable grace period.

5. Revise the definition of public nuisance so that negative economic and negative aesthetic effects can be used to declare a boarded up or fenced property a public nuisance.

We also suggested that the Council may want to look at the relevant municipal codes from the cities of Long Beach, Sacramento, Stockton and Richmond which each have some pieces of the language we need in Costa Mesa.

Mayor Pro Tem Bever then asked the City Manager to look into this and report back.

With a little bit of luck, the Council may soon make the necessary changes to meet present realities. Then, we may see some improvement in neighborhoods that are suffering as a result of having long term boarded up and fenced properties in their midst.

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Those are our opinions. Thanks for reading them.

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