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City to bill code violators for cost of spring cleaning

If Tampa property owners don't clean up their acts, foreclosure could be next.

By JANET ZINK
Published March 17, 2005

TAMPA - A couple of mattresses. Television parts. Lumber. Yard waste.

These are the items city crews picked up Wednesday from a lot in Sulphur Springs whose owner has refused to respond to code enforcement citations and fines. The city will bill him for the job.

Workers will continue cleaning properties in violation through Saturday as part of "Operation Springs Cleaning," an effort that highlights Mayor Pam Iorio's steps to strengthen the city's code enforcement activities.

Shortly after taking office in 2003, Iorio created a Department of Code Enforcement, removing it from the Department of Business and Housing Development. A few weeks ago, Iorio signed an executive order authorizing foreclosure on properties owned by repeat violators. The City Council is scheduled today to earmark $50,000 to cover costs associated with foreclosing.

The order does not allow the city to take a property that serves as a person's primary residence. Instead, it focuses on repeat code violators who own rental properties and businesses and whose code violation fines are high enough to justify the cost of foreclosure.

"They're chronic offenders who know the system and take advantage of it," Iorio said. "Those are the people we're going after."

Code enforcement has already identified 50 foreclosure candidates throughout the city, said department director Curtis Lane. No action has been taken, but just announcing the policy has encouraged offenders to get into compliance.

"Folks have been calling and decided to pay up," Lane said. "How 'bout that?"

The city hasn't aggressively used foreclosure as a way to enforce cods since the first term of Mayor Sandy Freedman more than 14 years ago, said William Doherty, deputy director of code enforcement.

"We're going to target the most egregious offenders with the idea that they'll come into compliance," Doherty said. "Foreclosure isn't the goal."

Last year, Iorio authorized criminalizing code violations. She is considering increasing fines for repeat violators, televising code enforcement hearings to embarrass offenders and adding hearing masters to speed the process.

Neighborhood groups have asked that they receive notification of code enforcement hearings, as they do with rezoning requests, so they can have a say at hearings.

Roxane Kolar, an organizer with the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, applauded the mayor's foreclosure initiative.

"Sometimes people are renting out properties that have hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines and people are still allowed to live there," Kolar said. "They're paying rent in a place that code enforcement says is not livable."

Kolar also wants the city to do more to help people cited for code violations who don't have the money or ability to make repairs.

The city has a diversion program to help elderly, low-income and disabled people fix their homes and avoid fines. But the program has no funding and works by referring people to other agencies, such as Paint Your Heart Out.

Sulphur Springs resident Mary Hansen watched Wednesday while city workers mowed the grass on a neighbor's lot at the corner of Yukon and 15th streets.

She welcomed the aggressive approach the city is taking with landlords, noting that Sulphur Springs has many rental properties whose owners don't maintain them. "The neighborhood needs cleaning up," she said.

Iorio said the new policies will force everyone to meet the same standards.

[Last modified March 17, 2005, 01:05:07]