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Fort Wayne residents this week will have a new tool to fight dilapidated businesses and large apartment buildings in their neighborhoods.
The city’s commercial code ordinance takes effect Wednesday. For the first time, non-residential building owners will be required to at least provide basic maintenance to their properties.
The new law stemmed from planning efforts by the Southeast Area Neighborhood Partnership. Chairman Bill Crowley said residents often wondered why the city’s Neighborhood Code Enforcement officers could cite problems at homes but not at businesses.
“To me, this helps even the playing field,” he said. “Really, code enforcement didn’t have any teeth to make business owners improve their property.”
Cindy Joyner, neighborhood code director, said the point of the new law is not to attack property owners, but to encourage investment. She said some owners have expressed concerns that they are investing in their property, but it is negated by neighboring structures that are falling apart. The new law provides some security to those owners that the entire block will be maintained to some degree, Joyner said.
“It’s really to encourage investment in the city,” Joyner said. “It puts us in a stronger position to take care of vacant buildings.”
Joyner said she has already received sporadic complaints about businesses since the City Council passed the law in February, but she doesn’t expect there to be an abundance of new complaints. The department’s 12 officers and two supervisors are expected to handle the increased caseload, with new technology helping reduce the work on each case, she said.
The law change doesn’t only affect business owners, but homeowners as well, Joyner said. The process used to cite homeowners was changed to mirror the one created for commercial violators.
Joyner said the process was changed to help encourage property owners to fix problems.
For example, the new process gives the department more flexibility to work with property owners who are making progress on their buildings. She said under the current law, the department has to enforce its rules if an owner hasn’t fully remedied the problem on time.
“We have given tickets to people who are making progress on their home,” she said.
Of course, the city still has ways to force compliance on owners who refuse to work with the department.
If a property owner doesn’t make progress on a citation, Joyner said, the city will issue an order to repair and will scheduled a hearing. The hearing officer – who will likely come from the city’s law department – can provide time to comply, dismiss a case or assess a fine.
City Councilwoman Liz Brown, R-at large, said the council believed it necessary to add an appeals board so people wanting to fight the hearing officer’s decision didn’t have to go to court, which is often expensive.
The council created the Safe Housing and Building Oversight Committee, a nine-member board that reviews decisions of the hearing officer. The mayor selects six members, and the City Council picks three.
Brown said there were concerns that allowing a hearing officer to make the final decision could appear biased because that officer works for the mayor. The review board provides an independent look at the cases, as the board will contain members from different organizations, including Realtors, apartment owners and the Greater Fort Wayne Chamber of Commerce.
“I think the process is very fair,” Brown said.
People unhappy with the board’s decision can still take the issue to court.
The creation of the oversight committee means the elimination of the old citizen’s appeal board, which typically was there to grant people more time to comply with fixes, Joyner said.
Bernie Gump has been recommended as an appointment to the new board by the Fort Wayne Area Association of Realtors. He also served on the older appeals board. Gump did not believe most property owners would even notice a difference under the new law.
Gump said the new board will make sure residents are treated fairly, noting some people simply don’t have the money to make repairs.
“You can’t force people to spend money they don’t have,” he said.
Gump said the city has been good about working with property owners to find ways to finance repairs.
Even as the law is ready to take effect this week, there are some concerns about how it will be implemented.
Pone Vongphachanh, government affairs director with the Realtor association, said her group is waiting to see how strictly the city will enforce the law. She also said the new operating procedures and fine structure have yet to be presented.
Joyner said she hopes to present the new rules and penalties to the oversight committee soon – the law requires the oversight group to approve those rules and fines. She said the goal is to be fair and consistent with enforcement, and fines will be based on the severity of a problem at the property. She said more serious problems need larger fines to give an incentive for owners to comply – they may ignore a fix if it’s cheaper to pay a penalty.
The law allows the hearing officer to issue fines for up to $2,500. It also includes a sunset provision that would allow the law to expire in three years without another vote by the City Council.
Joyner said she has spent the past several months trying to educate groups about the new law, including neighborhood associations and business groups. She said she has a meeting with Vongphachanh next week.
Enforcement of commercial violations will be complaint-driven, Joyner said, and people should not be concerned that the city will be looking to fine property owners.
“Really we’re about compliance, not about fines,” she said.
