Ashland City Council
Work Session Minutes
Thursday, September 25, 2008 7:00 p.m.
Thursday, September 25, 2008 Mayor’s Conference Room 7:00 p.m.
Purpose:
Housing Maintenance
Attendance:
Council members: Ruth Detrow W3, Paul Wertz W4/President,
Stephen Stuart At Large, Robert L. Valen-
tine W1, Robert M. Valentine W2
Mayor: Glen P. Stewart
Assistant to the City Engineer: Larry Paxton
Building & Zoning: Roger Gordon
Council Clerk: Valarie Bishoff
Housing Committee: Nevin Bowers
Law Director: Richard P. Wolfe II
Housing Committee: John Chorpening
Housing Committee: Roger Hazen
Housing Committee: Keith Ballantyne
Media: T-G: Ginger Christ
Public
Roll Call: Ruth Detrow W3, Paul Wertz W4/President, Stephen Stuart At
Large, Robert M. Valentine W2
Move to excuse Robert L. Valentine W1 by Paul Wertz. (He will be
arriving late)
Pledge of Allegiance:
Paul Wertz - Tonight’s meeting is a Work session on Housing
Maintenance. I will turn the meeting over to Ruth Detrow.
Ruth Detrow: This is by way of a report to the Mayor, Council and the
Public. The committee has worked diligently and they have done
good work and we have reached the point where there is nothing that we
can do now except ask for Legislation. It is in the Legislative
Body’s hands after tonight. There was not nearly so much
that needed to be legislated as I had thought at least and that is what
the first section, section 2 of your agenda is. It is my thought
at least that we ought to have something that has been compiled from
what we already have with references to the applicable Ordinances which
we already have so that we know how to proceed and then there are a few
holes that need to be plugged and I am going to be asking Council about
those toward the end of our meeting. But right now we already
have in 521.05 an Ordinance about drainage of lawns and saying that you
cannot obstruct it and you can’t flood your neighbor. We
also have an Ordinance about keeping sidewalks in repair and clean, and
you can see from your agenda that is 521.06. Keeping yards free
of garbage, junk, refuse and other matter Ordinance. And that is
quite lengthy. But what it amounts to and I would like to read a little
bit from this because we get complaints about this and I think it is
okay since we weren’t sure that we had a law that said you had to
keep your yard free of refuse and junk, but we do. It explains
what junk is and its old or scrap copper, brass, rope, rags, batteries,
paper, rubber, lumber, pipe, used building material, roofing, old or
held for sale for re-melting purposes by an establishment having other
facilities for processing and on and on it goes. Refuse includes
ashes, crockery, bottles, cans, paper and other wood pulp products,
boxes, rags, grass clippings and other cut vegetation, older discarded
clothing, bedding, mattresses, furniture, appliances, rubbish, dirt,
nails, pieces of glass, oil and all other similar nonputrescible
wastes. You are not allowed to throw it, deposit it or let
somebody put it on your lawn, on your property. And this is
already in an Ordinance. We have one about not causing noxious or
offensive odors. You cannot do that either. We have an
Ordinance already for not causing infestation by insects or
rodents. The owner, or the person living on the property is
responsible for getting rid of insects or rodents that are on the
property. Those of us on Council will remember that we have had
many, many discussions about that. The rats are running into the
house because my neighbor has a building that has all sorts of rats
running in and out and they are not there and now it is
spreading. We already have an Ordinance for this. We
have a couple about partition fences. The fact that people have
to share the cost of a partition fence and the fact that on a property
that is a property that is a residential property, it can’t be
more than 6’ high. By the way, in a business area, it can
only be 3’ high. So these are all things that we already
have and it seems to me we need to put them in some kind of form so
they are easy for us to get at and I would appreciate some comments
from Council and the Public on that. What can we do?
Paul Wertz: Do we need to change any laws Rick, because we have the
State Fire code; it covers a lot of this. Health Department
covers a lot of this. Plus what we already have. We just need
enforcement, I guess. That is the main thing.
Richard P. Wolfe II: It is not like we haven’t had any
enforcement or hadn’t done any. As far as this junk and
trash Ordinance 521.08, Council created that back in 1977.
We have sent hundreds if not thousands of letters pertaining to
complaints about that and many of them get cleaned up and sometimes
they end up going to court over it. There is always going to be
problems and somebody is always going to see something and there is
always going to be something that doesn’t get cleaned up right
away or somebody doesn’t respond to it but I don’t think we
need to change much of anything. There may be a couple of things
at the end there we don’t have that you might want to consider
and that is certainly Council’s discretion. I think what
Mrs. Detrow is talking about is if somebody wanted to know all of the
Ordinances that pertain housing or
housing maintenance, there is one place they could look, other than
saying the Codified Ordinance book, which includes a lot of other
things. There isn’t any one single place and I think Mrs.
Detrow has made up a list of the various Ordinances that she has found
that relate to this general subject and I mentioned to her earlier that
if we wanted to unofficially put together some sort of listing
compendium or listing of all of those Ordinances that were related an
run them off and make copies available and then make references to the
Ordinance sections. There is no harm in that. I don’t
think it requires any specific adoption or enactments.
Keith Ballantyne: There needs to be something put together that
the public could recognize and know where these things are. If it
is not compiled, it is all over the place.
Ruth Detrow: That is a perfect comment because Roger has started
to do that; to a certain extent at least. Would you be willing to
explain to us what you are doing which will eventually be on our
website?
Roger Gordon: Just over the years we had numerous, different
questions that people ask as to where can they find a particular
Ordinance or how can they resolve a particular problem. So we
have actually come up with a couple of pages of frequently asked
questions and then we have attempted to supply answers to those
questions and not only supply the answers but then put an Ordinance
such that they can reference the Ordinance. We don’t have
it in a format ready to put to our webpage right now but we do have
some copies, I can give you some copies of some common things that we
hear from people. I am sure it is not a complete list. We
are hoping to add to it and add it to the page such that people can go
to the web page and find their answers. It will help us; maybe
relieve some of the phone calls that we get. And consumer
time. And of course, if we get it to the web we can also make
copies of it and just provide it to people at the counter as people
show up at the counter. If you look at this, one of them is just
“Do I need a permit for a fence?” I know that
is one of your questions. And what are the requirements for
installing a swimming pool on a residential property. We get
those questions 15 times a month, I am sure. Do I need a permit
to install or replace shingles, house siding or any other exterior
surfaces? We suggest to them as to what they need to do as far as
a permit but at the same time we kind of encourage them into this that
we hope that they do some maintenance things to prevent issues that
relate to public safety and property values. It is kind of a
nicety page. It is giving the answer to you but not just go look
at this reference. It is giving it to you
verbally. Installing an accessory building, types of
yard maintenance; what type of yard maintenance is required in the city
of Ashland. Are there sidewalk regulations in the city of
Ashland? What requirements does the city of Ashland have
regarding signs? Some of these have already changed as far as
what the answers might be but once we get it to the page, we can always
change the answer slightly if we need to. I am sure each
Councilperson has ideas that we might be able to add to that and add to
reference sections. If you get down to that reference Codified
Ordinance section, sidewalk, construction, damage or injury, improper
drainage. You and I didn’t collaborate on this so these are
some of the things you have are common things that I have here. A
duty to keep sidewalk in repair and clean. The positive
accumulations to garbage, junk, refuse and others. The trimming
of trees and shrubbery. Removal of weeds. Existing
sidewalks as to how they are to be kept and just some general yard
regulations. Once we get that into a format, I have already
talked to the IT guys. They are happy to work with us and promote
it and put it in some sort of, with some pictures to kind of enhance it
as to the web page.
Ruth Detrow: And that would be printable then?
Roger Gordon: Certainly, we can print it.
Ruth Detrow: I did not specifically invite our computer
people tonight but I think you said that probably 10% of the populous
reads this?
Roger Gordon: When you and I met with them independently, they
suggested to us that only 8-10% of citizens actually inquire over the
computer as to this type of material or as to even the home page.
So it is kind of shocking that is all the better response we get with
the home page.
Ruth Detrow: I know that this is a work in progress and of course
it will never really be done because things will come up. Do you
have people in your office who have the time and expertise to do this
as quickly as possible?
Roger Gordon: Not as quickly as possible as I would like.
No. Lindsay was actually working on this and we lost Lindsay at
this point as to her being employed. I have got a few hours from
her a week or every other week presently but she is kind of a person
that has geared this up and she understands it and being that she is
not from our community. She lives outside of the city. She
does have some real true questions because she is similar as to a
citizen, she doesn’t know where to look. So sometimes she
researches these things a little better than what other people would
just because she doesn’t know the answer to the question.
Ruth Detrow: So we will eventually; and I wish we had a date on
eventually; I don’t want to try to nail down specific date and
say there has to be something on the computer by that
day.
Roger Gordon: Well I am sure that they can add these things
pretty quick with Bear and with Sean, you know as far as getting them
to the web page but then as to a constant update, then it is just
something that we have to continually add to; then address the
different issues that are pertinent to Council.
Mayor Stewart: I can say that the IT people, once the document is
prepared and actually in the format to put on the screen or the system;
it isn’t going to be of any significant time; certainly less than
a week. That is after it is totally ready for them to put it on
the system.
Ruth Detrow: Since you already have a print out; is this the
format you are thinking would work?
Roger Gordon: I think it is written similar to
Berea’s. It is similar in text and language as to not
getting too detailed into the particulars of the Ordinances but
allowing you to reference the Ordinances if you want to. We do
now have Codified available on the net so you can go from this to the
Codified if you want to and look those particular Ordinances up.
Ruth Detrow: And they already have that done?
Roger Gordon: Yes. And make that comparison if you want to
make the comparison, if you want to get into the technical data; you
can go to technical data or you can take this as laymen’s answer
to the question.
Ruth Detrow: I knew that I had taken that CD to them.
Thanks Mr. Wolfe. I don’t know that we have our Codified
Ordinances on the CD but we do and they have it now.
Roger Gordon: I think it is available if you know the process to
get there. You have to talk to Bear to be sure. I can get
there. I don’t know whether we have made it clear to the
general public.
Ruth Detrow: You know weeks ago, I was pushing hard, it has to do
with this, but not entirely. Egovlink is a wonderful tool to use
and it is a part of our city website. Egovlink is something that
will help you communicate with different departments in the city and
make comments and say things about one of the problems that are
addressed here. And I was talking to our city Librarian because I
had spoken to one of the other Librarians and said, if someone came
into the Library and asked you, someone who was computer illiterate
came into the Library and asked you to help them get on the city
website and get into egovlink, would you help them? And they said
yes and when I talked to the Librarian the other day, she said we
actually had a class all set showing people how to use the computer to
access our whole city government because certainly transparency in our
city government is something that we all want. They canceled the
class because nobody signed up. I don’t know what to do
next on that. I honestly don’t know. But anyhow, it
will be wonderful to have that. Do you think that will work
Nevin, a printout like this?
Nevin Bowers: All I am saying is, I am a citizen and have been
involved with the city. There is always the cumbersome thing of
trying to pinpoint things or trying to find things. So there
needs to be compiled, I don’t care how many pages it takes,
compiled that you have a document anybody can look at and know exactly
where to go for any circumstances. Some are not covered. A
couple of questions that I have, relating to the penalty for
noncompliance. Is that penalty strong enough that it is going to
make somebody comply, rather than a daily, day at a time type penalty
rather than a one-time penalty if you don’t comply, the fine is
sufficient that it is going to hurt a little bit? One of the
other questions that I have is one of the major things in building a
maintenance code is aesthetics. I don’t see anything about
exterior surfaces. And maintaining exterior surfaces.
Ruth Detrow: There isn’t anything and I should have put
that as item C. I have it now.
Nevin Bower: That is probably the top question for many people in
a Maintenance Code. Exterior surfaces, grass, weeds, and trash.
Paul Wertz: Roger, this is your area; is there anything you have
run into that needs changed in the Ordinances or Charter or anything
that would help you more in your department?
Roger Gordon: I think if you are going to lean towards exterior
surfaces and from the last Committee meeting that we had I think there
was about 18 or 19 pages of minutes. As I went through and just
re-briefed myself on those minutes; about every third paragraph was in
relationship to paint and paint peel and those types of things that
maybe aren’t addressed directly enough that we can enforce it.
Paul Wertz: You don’t want to address too tight.
Roger Gordon: Well, I think that has been the question, and I
think if you had the opportunity to read those minutes you could see by
the different comments that the Committee Members had in regards to
that. And I think again, if you had the opportunity, there was a
lot of conversation back and forth that the whole thing has been a good
process for us because I think we had the opportunity to make a lot
more people familiar with some of the answers to the questions and then
become more familiar ourselves as to helping in educating the general
public as to their needs and where it might be and the answer to our
questions. I think that is why we have kind of addressed this as
frequently asked questions and a lot of phone calls that we get are;
they start off people saying, you probably can’t answer this
question; but they do call and we then attempt to answer the question
for them. And a lot of times it does have to do with compliance
whether it be them or a neighbor.
Ruth Detrow: Since we are on that subject, I have added section C
part 3 which is surface of paint on houses. And this is an
area which may need legislative action. If we do anything we have
to pass legislation to do it. I need to know if it is even worth
my asking Rick to please put together the legislation because in some
cities I believe it is 15% of the paint is damaged and then it goes up
to a much higher percentage and so let me ask members of Council and
the Public too; Do we want to do that? Do we want to do it now?
Do we want to do it later when times are a little bit better and money
is more plentiful? What do we want to do about paint
surfaces? I think everything here is going to have to be
complaint-driven because we don’t have investigators to go around
and look at the paint on every house. It is going to have to be;
“The House next to me is driving down my value of property
because it is 50% of the surface is falling off; so Council do we want
to do anything now? Or do we not?
Robert M. Valentine W2: You start on surfaces of paint, then you
go to roofs …… you drive around town, I
see porches hanging down. You were talking about fines. We
did the one out here on cottage. What was that fine Rick, $25.00?
Richard P. Wolfe II: Yes plus court costs. As far as
answering the question about fines and what are the penalties, as far
as criminal penalties; most of them are minor misdemeanors on a
first offense, become 4th degree misdemeanor on a second offense which
is slightly higher, possible penalty. On a scale of criminal
justice, these are not going to be 1st degree misdemeanors. It is
not going to be serious criminal offenses. I am not thinking we
are going to put anyone in jail for 6 months because they do not paint
their house. The penalties, if somebody is found guilty of the
offense, it is up to the discretion of the judge of penalty
ranges. So we do have a few penalties where we have minimum
penalties such as our income tax Ordinance, there is a minimum
fine. For the most part, we have to be careful not to interfere
with judicial discretion on assessing fines and penalties. There
are Building Codes and then there are Housing Codes. Building
Codes are how you build them and what the standards are they have to
meet. Housing Codes tend to be the maintenance, the exterior and
the surfaces. We don’t have a Housing Code. We do
have a Building Code. Most any city that I know of that has any
kind of Housing or exterior maintenance code has a department that does
nothing but deal with that; and they have inspectors that go around and
they issue notices and they come back to re-inspect. That is
their full time job. It is a department that does that, it is all
they do. We don’t have that and we have to create that. I
certainly don’t think that what it would take to affectively
enforce a full-blown home maintenance housing code would be something
that Roger and his current staff have extra time to deal with. If
we are going to go in that direction; we have to be prepared to link it
up with the resources it is going to take to enforce it.
Robert M. Valentine W2: I don’t think we want to become the
Housing Police.
Richard P. Wolfe II: That is a decision Council has to make.
Robert M. Valentine W2: Also when I get calls and complaints; I
go out and look at stuff and if it is offensive to me; I know it is
offensive to them if they are living next to someone. It is
almost a case-by-case basis. A lot of times you houses that are
in foreclosure; you have houses that people died and there is no
estate. You have government houses out here with weeds high and
the federal government says, “We don’t want you to mow it,
because it sells quicker when the weeds are high”. And if
the city does it, who are they going to bill? That is money we
lose. That is a true story Glen. I was talking to Meyer and
he said the Government says, even though his sign is in the yard, the
Government says you do not touch that yard because they sell
faster. People think they are getting a deal. That is
exactly what he told me.
Richard P. Wolfe II: I have had people that have complained when
somebody painted their house, but they didn’t like the
color. Or there was another case where somebody started painting
their house and got about halfway done and quit and then that looked
almost worse than if they hadn’t painted at all.
Mayor Stewart: But the surface is covered.
Richard P. Wolfe II: I guess you are just going to have to
decide; if you are going to get into this; you have to be prepared to
deal with it fully.
Roger Hazen: Can I say something? I was a housing inspector
for the City of Crestline. We had two people and a secretary in
our department. That is all we did; was go and look at the
houses. That was our job. We had the property maintenance
code and that was our bible we went with. But there were times
that you just had to back off. You have an elderly lady who is 90
years old and no money and so you back off, talk to church
people. This is a judgment thing. You can hit everyone down
the street with paint jobs but most of them are not going to be able to
do it. You are going to have to pick your battles. It took
two full-time people and a secretary to run this department for 5,000
people.
Robert M. Valentine W2: I have a problem with selective
enforcement though. If you are going to enforce something, you
enforce it. You do not just pick and choose.
Richard P. Wolfe II: The last meeting we had, a full committee
meeting; It seemed like the general consensus of the committee members
there just wasn’t a lot of desire to move in that direction to a
comprehensive housing code or home maintenance code and it seemed like
what we were going to try to do from that point was pick out a few
things that we thought were particularly needing in the city and Mrs.
Detrow has several of those listed. With the maintenance
code it almost has got to be all or nothing. It is hard to
pick. Council will have to decide.
Ruth Detrow: Is paint surface something we want to address
legislatively; right now there is nothing in our city Ordinances that
says you have to repaint after your paint starts to peel? Do we
want to ask Mr. Wolfe? There are all sorts of levels of
stringency. Everything from 15% peeling, you have to re-paint the
whole building up to 25,35, 40% and you have to re-paint that
side.
I don’t believe there was any support for that at those committee
meetings.
Ruth Detrow: It didn’t sound like a lot, no.
Robert M. Valentine W2: You have to look at the times you are
dealing with. That has a lot to do with everything. Some
people out there are having a hard time getting by. Paint is not
cheap. A lot of times older people can’t do it themselves
and can’t afford getting anybody to do it for them.
Ruth Detrow: I just want sort of a feeling what Council wants to
do.
Mayor Stewart: I would like to ask some questions of the
committee: Paint is only one form of covering of a house.
There could be dilapidated aluminum siding that the paint is perfect
on. There could be a shingle gone. When you talk about
paint; are you talking about any exterior surface regardless of what it
is?
Ruth Detrow: Yes, I think that is what our committee was
seeking. Do we want to say, “No we do not want to do this
right now?” or do we want to ask Mr. Wolfe to draft an Ordinance
to consider it?
Stephen Stuart: You know you start with, what do we want Ashland
to be, present and future? I suspect it will all weigh in favor
of that we want Ashland to be as aesthetically attractive as possible
and people taking care of their homes. Now you get to the reality
of things, and you have talk about having to establish a department to
enforce it; but I think even more important is the economic times that
we are faced with now and how this would impact people. You
cannot pick and choose. If it is going to impact adversely a
property owner who is renting the property, then I don’t care,
but you cannot pick your battles that way. It is a dilemma.
Ruth Detrow: I am getting the feeling that Council does not want
and of course we can’t vote or anything like that. It is
not that kind of meeting. This is a Work Session. I am
getting the feeling that Council wants to at least delay any decision
on this for a year or two, that is just my guess, what do you
think? On this specific thing, surfaces of houses. I am
going to take that as a yes for a delay.
Richard P. Wolfe II: I would suggest that in order to determine
when you may want to revisit that, whether it is near or further down
the road; I think that is going to have to come when the city does its
appropriations and if they can find a place to put in sufficient
resources to address this on the basis of which you have just
mentioned, then you can put the mechanism into place and go forward;
but unless those two pieces come together at the same time; I think it
is kind of a mute point. I do not think it is going to be
effective; so the other I think almost has to come first and in such
time whether it is 2009 or 2010 or whenever it may be, you can say this
has become one of our financial priorities and you have the resources
to do it and then it won’t take much to put the mechanism into
place because we have already done a lot of that research. There
are several options that Roger has looked at that may be suitable and
we can go from there. It just seems to me that those two decisions have
to kind of go hand in hand.
Nevin Bowers: It needs to be a full-blown Maintenance Code
or it is going to be pick and choose. Whether it is time for it
now or drop it now and down the road, do it. If the economic
times are such that Council feels that it is not appropriate, so be it.
Paul Wertz: Rick do you remember the C.H.I.P Grant we get every
year? Doesn’t part of that Grant money go for stuff like
this when people can’t afford to paint their house?
Richard P. Wolfe II: Community Housing Improvement Program is
what that stands for. We have made a number of loans through that
program and it is not; I don’t believe the entire city is
included; there are certain areas or zones that are determined low to
moderate income and so that is a tool that we have been using.
There have been two or three foreclosures a year that our C.H.I.P Grant
is involved and it is normally a second mortgage and if there is a
foreclosure, there is probably not enough equity to pay off the first
mortgage and usually you don’t get that money back. But it
is Grant money and it is not out of pocket for our money but the money
that gets paid back does go back into the program.
Paul Wertz: But there is money out there for them.
Richard P. Wolfe II: Well that is an option, it is not wide
spread. I don’t know what the annual amounts are that we
get but it is something that is there and has been used.
Keith Ballantyne: What is the extent of the problem, what
percentages of properties are in trouble this way? We need to do
a little survey I think. That would dictate how soon you would
address the problem.
Ruth Detrow: What percent of houses in Ashland are in
disrepair? Two to three a year?
Robert M. Valentine W2: More than that. I get calls
all the time.
Richard P. Wolfe II: It is an ongoing thing. I don’t
think it is unique to Ashland.
Ruth Detrow: So do we want to bring it up in a Council meeting a
year from now?
Stephen Stuart: Well I think the idea of being part of the
process is important and it is also important as you prioritize the
kind of needs that we have. How does that stack up with some
other priorities?
Richard P. Wolfe II: That is an annual process.
Robert M. Valentine W2: We come up with our list every year.
Robert L. Valentine W1: Ruth, I am late and I apologize, but the
point was when you first brought this up, was it the recommendation or
was it the idea of just presenting the information and then have
Council react to that? Was it a recommendation by the
committee?
Ruth Detrow: No.
Robert L. Valentine W1: So the point was you were just what?
Ruth Detrow: I am hoping that we will either do or not do, but make a
decision one way or the other on a few things that we discussed in the
committee, also what you have there is something that Roger is working
on to make it available to the public. So we have made some
strides. We just need to know firmly exactly where we are.
But the committee at our last meeting and most who are here; they
pretty much said well you Council people were the ones who were saying
that we needed some laws for this and that; am I right?
Keith Ballantyne: Yes but at the committee meeting, as it ended,
we ended on the agreement of what you have here in part 2 things we
were considering. At that point we thought no need to pursue it
further.
Ruth Detrow: I think the committee was very surprised to learn
how much we actually have. I was surprised to learn how much we
actually have scattered throughout the Ordinances and as Mr. Wolfe
said; “There is a reason for them being where they
are.” And I am not suggesting that we pull them out of the
Ordinances and put them in a separate little book of just housing code
things but that we do as it says there and reference why according to
our Codified Ordinances why this, that and the other thing has to be
done.”
All right, budgetary process one year from this one. That is when
we will discuss again very briefly at least surfaces of houses?
Roger Hazen: I think it should be everything on your list that
should be looked at?
Nevin Bowers: Is this being delayed until next
year?
Ruth Detrow: I am asking
Stephen Stuart: Well number 2 is in effect so the question is
what about a and b? That is the question right?
Ruth Detrow: Right. Lets go to a first; removal of weeds
and the Ordinance number is there. I would appreciate it if Mr.
Wolfe would explain what we were talking about and I do have a couple
of things to add to it. Some additional research that I have
done. We have been thinking about maybe the way Mansfield does
it, is a good idea because they actually do have a process for making
sure that the grass is mowed in the lawns in Mansfield. Mr. Wolfe
would you?
Richard P. Wolfe II: Well, they do it and they also have a department
that does it and it is called the Building and Codes Department and not
to be confused with our Building and Zoning Department because this
department in Mansfield does a lot of different functions as it relates
to grass and weeds and maintenance clean up and that sort of
thing. I think they have about 10 or 12 people on staff and they
have the city dividend into 4 quadrants and an Inspector for every
quadrant and so forth. What I told Mrs. Detrow when we met on
this the other day and there are three areas here that come into play
and unfortunately budgetary considerations are significant in all three
of them. (1) is sidewalks because part of the reason that
in my opinion, part of the reason the sidewalk program has stalled,
there is a variety, but one is that we didn’t commit sufficient
resources to putting in the sidewalks ourselves which is a
pre-requisite before we can assess the cost. If we are going to
assess the cost for putting in sidewalks, we have to go ahead and do
it. So we have to be prepared to do that. That is a
budgetary consideration that was part of the material that I provided
to you in the letter, the envelope I gave you about sidewalks here
recently. (2) The second one that has been mentioned in
that is this exterior maintenance, if this is the route we want to go,
we have to be prepared to commit resources and that is people and
additional monies to do that to effectively address the problem.
(3) The third one is the problem with grass mowing. I think that
we could compress the process if we are prepared to devote some
sufficient resources to effectively doing a lot of the mowing
ourselves. Now I know we do already and you were going to check
and see how much we have already expended in terms of time or money to
do that. Do you have some idea of that?
Ruth Detrow: They have an average of eight lawns they mow for
summer.
Richard P. Wolfe: Eight? That would be one week’s
worth and then maybe the same lawn a number of times. There is a
process under state law and Mansfield uses it. I don’t
think it is really meant to deal as much with grass and weeds as it is
with structures. But it does talk in terms of abating nuisance
and we have termed high grass and weeds as a nuisance situation.
But in order to make the process function, Mansfield gives notice of
the problem, and if it is not corrected within a certain number of
days, 3 or 5, they co out and mow it, they send a bill. If the
bill is not paid, they assess it on the taxes. Okay now that
doesn’t mean that they get money back dollar for dollar because
there are a number of variables. First of all there is cut off in
September for anything that is to be assessed on taxes for the next
year to submitted to the Auditor; so anything after September for in
2008 won’t appear on tax duplicate until 2011. So there is
a time lag. There is uncollectible circumstances; Foreclosures,
Bankruptcies, Deaths. There are delinquent taxes and things of
that sort. So nothing is returned from assessment unless
something is collected; so it is only the collected taxes and the
assessments don’t come back at the same rate as the money is
expended. You expend all the money up front and then you
get the assessments back over a period of time. So you subtract
the time lag and the losses and it is not a dollar for dollar
return. But the process can be compressed if we are willing to go
ahead and do it ourselves or pay somebody to do it, then bill them and
then assess it on the taxes. One of the reasons why we seem to
have a delay with our current process is the really only hammer we have
is criminal prosecution which we don’t really, our objective is
not to take people to court and punish them criminally for not mowing
their grass. We try to encourage and cajole and urge and a lot of
people take care of it and some slower than others; and others
don’t. The ones that have been safety issues, I think we
have taken care of on our own and we haven’t really; we have been
more concerned about the safety then the return of the money. If
we are going to collect the money, there is a specific process that you
have to go through and so that is part of the reason why we had delay
with the way we had been doing it in the past. I found out about
Mansfield’s procedure, I talked with their Law Director; I have
talked with our County Auditor and we can do it but we have to be
willing to commit resources to it. So this is why I said this is
another item that we should put on the agenda for the Appropriations
for 2009. As we are pretty much through the grass mowing season
for this year.
Robert M. Valentine W2: Rick, didn’t their City Council
raise the rate because they had it like $50.00 dollars?
Richard P. Wolfe II: Well like a Bank in California owns a
property and they would be happy to pay the city $50.00 bucks to mow
the yard. So they did raise their rates to $200- $300
dollars. And that doesn’t mean they are collecting it, but
that means maybe those people are going to take care of it themselves.
Robert M. Valentine W2: Yes, but if you mow three yards and you
collect $200-$300 dollars for just one, that would cover all three.
Richard P. Wolfe II: I am not saying it is a bad idea; I am
saying we can do it and we can compress the time factor and we can get
things done more quickly. I think here again it is; are we going
to go looking for them? Or are we just going to wait for the problems
to come to use and how are we going to address them? That is an
issue. How much money are we going to commit to the effort and they
also, and if I am understanding this and you are familiar with it and
please correct me; but I think that department also deals with some
maintenance issues. It also deals with some junk and trash.
I respectfully suggest that before we bite off too much, lets try it in
a limited capacity; see how it works; see how we are doing and then if
we want to expand it to clean ups and some maintenance and repair; I
think without even having a home maintenance code, the applicable
statute here could be used to shore up some of those porches that are
falling and things like that and then we can still send the bill,
whatever the bill may be for the labor and the materials and so
forth. But I don’t think, and it all depends on how much
money we are willing to front for that to do that.
Roger Hazen: The City of Westerville does the same thing.
They have their Parks Department go out and do their mowing. So
it is all in-house. So they don’t have to hire somebody to
come in. So they are saving money there. They figure that
because the people are already on their payroll.
Richard P. Wolfe II: But if we were to add those responsibilities
to our existing personnel, I think there would be somewhat of a dilemma.
Mayor Stewart: If I may, I think it has to be decided; does this
Council want to fund these processes? And once the decision is
made to fund the process, then whether it is done outside or inside is
another decision that can be made.
Richard P. Wolfe II: For the most part, that will be an Executive
decision.
Mayor Stewart: I am not going to set here and cry poor; I am
going to suggest that anything we add to the 2009 Budget comes out as
something that we have allocated and appropriated that is going to be
the same for 2009 as it is 2008 if we are lucky. I don’t
fight this; I am just sharing with you that balloon is so big and when
you squeeze it here, it is going to get bigger over here. I would
love to see Ashland a spic and span beautiful city, corridor side
streets and all. And I would suggest to you that if we have mowed
eight lawns there are at least 25 or 30 that we have had calls on that
we haven’t responded to because of maybe it didn’t go so
far as to go to Rick, but there are a multitude of lawns with high
grass. Once we start doing it, and the residents recognize it;
the phone is going to ring and we are going to have to fund it
adequately to that and as Rick has pointed out, if in fact it has to go
to a tax duplicate, it is just budgeted money that won’t flow
back in for several years.
Ruth Detrow: I called the lady in Mansfield who was so
helpful about this and she said the City of Mansfield and they are 2
½ times the size of Ashland; they have 1200 to 1300 lawns to mow
every year and about 50 of those pay up right away and it doesn’t
have to go through the other process.
Mayor Stewart: I may have grossly underestimated this.
Ruth Detrow: I was kind of surprised.
Richard P. Wolfe II: It sounds like a significant outlay of
resources.
Ruth Detrow: Yes it does. This does not require any
legislation.
Richard P. Wolfe II: There is no change that it is
necessary to do that other than to be prepared to put some anxious pork
behind it. There is at least one item that was discussed; it is
not an exterior item; and it is not grass and weeds. This was an
issue that had come before Council a number of years ago. There
was not sufficient support and it has been talked about and now it is
back for consideration.
Ruth Detrow: That is b, fencing of swimming pools. Right
now one can put a swimming pool into the back yard and have no fence at
all and the neighbors can send their kids over to play and one of them
can drown. Someone just can be walking across the yard and step
into it. I don’t know how we have gone this long without a
tragedy and it has been many, many years since there was. Now I
am getting my personal feelings into this and I shouldn’t.
What is Council’s and the Public’s view about the fact that
we have absolutely no Ordinance that says we must fence a swimming pool
in the city?
Robert M. Valentine W2: I think most people who put an in-ground
pool in do fence them for privacy. And above ground pools; I had
a guy call me in the spring and asked if there was any Ordinance on
above ground pools and I said I don’t think so. It has to
be in the back yard. He said that he had one of the ladders that
you lock up and it is a 4 ½ foot pool. A little kid could
not fall in an above ground pool. But most people I think, if
they put in an in-ground pool, they want some privacy. I
don’t think I have seen any in-ground pool that doesn’t
have a fence around it.
Mayor Stewart: There are some.
Robert L. Valentine W1: I think most of the people in Ashland
think you have to have a fence once you put the pool up.
Richard P. Wolfe II: There may be insurance
issues. Their Home Insurance may require them to have a
fence put up or they wont have adequate coverage. There are a lot of
reasons why somebody may on their own have a fence installed.
Robert M. Valentine W2: I never remember seeing in the
paper for as long as I have lived in this town anybody drowning in a
pool.
Ruth Detrow: Because we have been lucky. Does Council want
to ask Mr. Wolfe to draft legislation or not?
Stephen Stuart: I support an Ordinance for in-ground only.
Robert M. Valentine W2: Yes, I support it.
Robert L. Valentine W1: I support it also.
Paul Wertz: Yes.
Robert M. Valentine W2: Most do and the ones that don’t,
should. If you can afford a pool, you can afford a pool, you can
afford a fence.
Ruth Detrow: Is there anything else that we need to say as far as
Housing Maintenance is concerned?
Mayor Stewart: I would suggest that not wait; if the
housing maintenance is going to be re-addressed for 2010, it needs to
be considered next fall in 2009 at a point early enough that we can
address it in the budget.
Ruth Detrow: In October?
Mayor Stewart: At least by October.
Paul Wertz: Roger, if there is anything that you think we need to
address, think about it.
Roger Gordon: Go back to the minutes of that last committee
meeting; you know Rick and I are always looking for new ideas and new
opportunities/options. So as we come across those we will present
them to you if we think it is something that is feasible or workable to
do.
Ruth Detrow: Valarie, can you remind us in one year?
Valarie Bishoff, Clerk: I will do that, yes.
Richard P. Wolfe II: I think we accomplished more than one
thing because assessing what we have and looking at various options and
considering what the pieces are to all that have to come together to
make the whole thing work in the different areas and as far as any
specific new legislation, yes there is only one proposal. I think
the committee has looked at this very carefully and worked with all the
members and it is to be commended.
Nevin Bowers: Question Roger; under #2 item g, maintaining 6 foot
high fence. In the front of the house and around, is that still 3
feet? Just so that doesn’t get out and get misconstrued.
Roger Gordon: Yes. But it is not on something that is out of this
room I don’t think. I think that was a
mis-interpretation. If you get an opportunity, I will let
you see what we have got in ours. Ours was written a little
clearer as to what we are proposing.
Richard P. Wolfe II: Those titles are only indicative, they are
not controlling what is down in the body of the section. But what Roger
has put together is kind of a guide in directing people to various
areas and we talked a little earlier about he said 8-10% use.
That 8-10% may be half of the people who have questions.
Mayor Stewart: Item A under Roman numeral III. Removal of
weeds, 547.02 and if you want to take noxious or poisonous out, is this
something that can be addressed without Charter?
Richard P. Wolfe II: I don’t recommend that it being
changed. That is consistent with the language of the state
statute when they talk about poisonous and noxious weeds. I
don’t think there is any harm with it being there. I am not
recommending it be changed one way or the other.
Mayor Stewart: So how does this address high grass?
Richard P. Wolfe II: There is more than just those words.
There were just some questions whether those words were unnecessary or
misplaced and I cite, they are not.
Questions or comments?
Motion to adjourn meeting by Paul Wertz, moved by Robert M. Valentine
W2, seconded by Ruth Detrow.
Ayes: Ruth Detrow, Paul Wertz, Steve Stuart,
Robert L. Valentine W1, Robert M. Valentine W2.
Meeting adjourned at 8:05 p.m.
Submitted by
Valarie F. Bishoff
Clerk of Council