06-22-15 Common Council Meeting Minutes

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REGULAR MEETING JUNE 22.2015 22 -15 PUBLIC HEARING ON A BILL OF THE COMMON COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF SOUTH BEND, INDIANA, AND AMENDING CHAPTER 19, ARTICLE 2 OF THE SOUTH BEND MUNICIPAL CODE IN ITS ENTIRETY ADDRESSING ABATEMENT REGULATIONS ADDRESSING TALL GRASS, WEEDS, NOXIOUS WEEDS AND RANK OR OVERGROWN VEGETATION AND FURTHER AMENDING SECTION 16 -61 OF THE SOUTH BEND MUNICIPAL CODE ADDRESSING PENALTIES Councilmember Karen White requested a motion to accept the substitute version for bill 22 -15. Sole moved by Councilmember Mr. Gavin Ferlic. Councilmember Derek Dieter seconded the motion which carried by a voice vote of nine (9) ayes. Councilmember Derek Dieter, Chairperson, Health & Public Safety Committee met this afternoon and send bill 22 -15 to the full Council favorably. Presenter: Council President Tim Scott, 711 Forest Ave., South Bend— Council members, Karen White, and Dr. Fred Ferlic and myself are the sponsors. The thing we want to bring up is shifting the financial burden from tax payers to those who should be mowing their lawn and who are subject to continuous enforcement. Secondly, that we are able to change the ordinance that hasn't been changed since 1962. Currently the maximum height in the current ordinance is twelve (12) inches for vacant and abandoned, and nine (9) inches for other homes. Code enforcement has to know which is vacant vs. other the homes, in the new proposal it will be nine (9) inches across the board making the ordinance simpler. The other issue not addressed is natural sustainable landscaping, people are doing rain gardens and other artistic native grasses with a natural look. The current ordinance only allows for bluegrass based in 1962. Right now if anyone was doing anything artistic it would be in violation of the ordinance. Also, the sidewalk not being overgrown is addressed in current and proposed. A new feature in this ordinance is continuous enforcement. Currently, we have people that own property in our city that our taxpayer's dollars go towards maintaining and cutting their grass on a yearly basis. In some instances there are people that have been on continuous enforcement for ten (10) years. So our city is putting our taxpayer's dollars, capacity, and resources towards that. This ordinance proposes a step up fine, for those on continuous enforcement. Those that are on continuous enforcement are people who are not responding to the city. They are getting a letter of violation, asked to come before code, asked to go to code hearing and yet they refuse to participate in making a change resolving the issue that they have on their own property. So what this would do is establish a ramp up /step up fee, $500 for the first year, $750 for the second year, and $1,000 for the third year, and $1,500 afterwards. The idea is to get the attention of those that are not conforming and come up with a permanent one time solution for this. The other part is the penalty for violation of the grass ordinance, the ordinance is now set between $20- $1,000. We will be making it uniform across the board to $250 violation across the board. One thing we handed out is the tall/grass weed enforcement and the continuous enforcement process so that everyone will understand. The citizens file a complaint and the code inspector goes out to look if there is a violation or no violation. If there is a violation they are asked to abate the nuisances grass within 48 hours. If they don't comply, the city can mow the lawn and the bill is then sent to collections or a lien is put in place. Again, I mentioned rain gardens here is an illustration of the rain garden which is not allowed under the current situation. (Powerpoint -Point Presentation on file with the ordinance. Councilmember Karen White — To the Council, we would like to say we see this as a quality life issue, shifting the financial burden from taxpayers who cut their grass on a regular basis to those who are subject to continuance enforcement. As President Scott stated this ordinance has not been updated since 1962, and we want to have some commonality in terms of the height. In this particular ordinance, we are stating nine (9) inches. We did our research as we stand as a city compared to others, looked at best practices to see where we stand as a city of South Bend to improve the quality of life in our neighborhoods. So we can work to protect home value, and have safe and clean neighborhoods. It is the homeowner's responsibility to cut their lawns. Citizens that live in certain neighborhoods that have grass almost to their waist, is not acceptable. We held a meeting last Tuesday, a lot of questions were posed, and I don't believe those questions were gathered; I think that is important. We also asked to have representatives from certain departments here from the city as well. Our goal as we work through this particular ordinance is similar to what we did with the product nuance. We will be working very closely to 7