06-10-19 Health and Public Safety

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CITY OF SOUTH BEND I OFFICE OF THE CLERK Committee Chair Broden then opened the floor to members of the public wishing to speak in favor of or in opposition to this legislation. There were none. She then turned the floor back to the Committee for further comment or main motions. Committeemember White made a motion to send Bill No. 19-42 to the full Council with a favorable recommendation. Committeemember Voorde seconded this motion which carried by a voice vote of four ayes. Committeemember Dr. Oliver Davis arrived at the meeting at 3:49 p.m. Update: Residential Safety Verification Program (RSVP) Ordinance Tracy Skibins, Director of Code Enforcement with offices located on the 13th floor of the County- City Building, stated, I'm here to give a brief overview of the first (1st) three (3) months of the Rental Safety Verification Program (referencing a presentation which is available in the City Clerk's Office). She then passed out a flier that is available in the City Clerk's Office and stated, Also, I will share some feedback from the working group as well. So, really quickly, the goal of the program is to improve the safety or rental housing in the City of South Bend. Primarily,we are hoping to help families with children and we began 2019 with already open housing cases. For 2020, we will be transitioning to the different Census Tracts and going by the levels of lead. She continued,Along the way,we have had to build, and are grateful for,our community partners. While we are here, I would like to introduce a few of them. We have Ann Watson who is the Executive Director of St. Vincent de Paul. We have Aubrey who is the client services coordinator. We have Shelby who is the Program Coordinator for us. And then Jamie, of course, is from the Mayor's Office.Again,we are fortunate for our community partners because although RSVP looks great on paper, it is a little bit more complicated with all these folks in. Without them, we would kind of be at a loss. I would like to highlight St. Vincent de Paul but also the Notre Dame Law Clinic and Judith Fox's crew. They have been amazing. The Volunteers Lawyers Network, the Fire Department and the Department of Child Services. This has also been a great time and opportunity for our inspectors to be provided training by these folks as well. So, our inspectors can go into these houses and inspect. They met with the Department of Child Services, the Human Rights Commission, the Fire Department, you name it. We are trying to get them as involved as possible so that they can know the ins and outs as well as offer resources to the people they come in contact with during some of these inspections they have. She went on, (Referencing a slide in the presentation) Here are some statistics. We have three hundred and eight(308) initial notices mailed and active cases. One hundred and thirty-two (132) total inspections. Thirty-two (32) of those were voluntary. Ten (10) landlords responded. The outcomes, we have twenty-five (25) certified units. Three (3) have been condemned and that is when we work with the folks over at St. Vincent de Paul. One hundred and eight (108) failed and seventy-two (72) fines as of right now. There were eight hundred (800) violations found. There is an average of six (6) violations per inspection and the top violations seem to be substandard walls, floors, ceilings, electric and plumbing. We are working on developing and sharing resources with landlords so that they can address these problems, even before the inspectors go out there so they know what it is we are looking for. That will save the landlord, the tenant and our inspectors time if they can address all of these issues before we even step foot into the property. EXCELLENCE ACCOUNTABILITY INNOVATION INCLUSION EMPOWERMENT 455 County-City Building 227 W.Jefferson Bvld South Bend,Indiana 46601 p 574.235.9221 f 574.235.9173 I 10574.235.5567 www.southbendin.gov 6