by Geoff Fox
Hancock and its town attorney are moving forward with citations against the owners of two properties that were to be demolished by order of the county.
Attorney Ed Kuczynski told town officials the citations would be served to the property owners of a house on High Street and a commercial building on Main Street. Once the citations are delivered, the individuals must appear in court.
A second set of citations could be sent if the first round doesn’t spur action, the attorney said.
Kuczynski said he wasn’t sure how many times it would take to actually get the property owners in court as it was his first time dealing this type of situation.
“It’s up to the court to set,” he said.
Both owners live out of state, so the citations were sent via certified mail.
“It would have worked a lot easier for us if they lived in state,” Mayor Roland Lanehart, Jr. said.
Identifying other properties
This brought up discussions from members of the public about other properties in Hancock that appear to be dilapidated.
One person asked if there is a waiting period before officials could petition the Washington County Building Code Appeals Board about other properties around town in similar shape as the ones on Main Street and High Street.
Kuczynski said those two properties are test cases as the county declared them as violations of building codes and the owners haven’t taken full action taken to remedy the situation.
One person said the property along Main Street across from Pittman’s Liquor is one of the properties that should be next on the county’s list as the front porch roof are falling down.
Kuczynski said the properties have to be identified and notices sent out to owners, at least under the proper codes, as it relates to structures and cite that code.
If no action is taken, then the matter moves up to the county.
Town Manager Mike Faith said the town would have to identify more properties in violation, get the county to come out and do inspections. If the problems are cosmetic, there’s nothing that can be done under the law.
“It has to be a public safety hazard,” Faith said.
Faith said they aren’t able to get in touch with the person who owns the property and the owner is in jail, he said.
Faith said he could get the councilmembers to go through and list the properties that need attention and then have the county get involved. The board to consider building conditions was only set up last year and Faith said he didn’t want to send a lot of properties through the system at one time.
Kuczynski said if the county’s inspectors could provide Faith and himself with the section of building codes that are being violated, letters can be sent to property owners to alert them to the violations.
The Main Street and High Street properties are the test cases that allow everyone to get their feet wet, he said.
Kuczynski added that if a few structures are brought into compliance, word would get out that the town wouldn’t allow buildings to just sit and people might voluntarily take care of the problems.
“We’re moving along,” he said.
The town’s building inspection and code enforcement is contracted through the county, but the county doesn’t do any current structure enforcement.
Lanehart said the town needs to make a list of those properties and, in turn, have Faith contact the county to alert them to multiple properties to look at.
Kuczynski said the only ways he can proceed to an actual adjudication is if the owners of the properties were to make aggressive movement to fix the properties and he could continue the case to make sure the repairs are finished.
Now, if the owners were to disregard the notices and citations and ignore them completely, Kuczynski said the law does allow penalties that could result in incarceration.
“I’ve been involved in this stuff for a long time. I honestly have never seen anybody go to jail on a municipal infraction,” he said. “But if it gets bad enough, I guess it happens.”
For example, Lanehart said if the porch roof on the Main Street house were be to blown off and hit someone walking down the street, then something criminal can be done about it.
“What this enforcement process is all about is to get people to fix things that are more than just cosmetic,” he said.
It’s for structural things such as holes in the back of the building, building that’s collapsing, and windows that are broken out.
Kuczynski said he could provide council with a draft of an ordinance from a previous town council that deals with issues like cosmetic and similar issues.
If they were to move in that direction of possibly adopting such an ordinance, Lanehart said the town would have to hire someone from outside of Hancock so they wouldn’t know anyone in town. Kuczynski said that person would also have had code training so they could review structures and apply the existing codes and any other the town would adopt.
Councilman Richard Strong said he understands there’s a lot of buildings not being used, but his focus is on Main Street because that’s what people see when they come to town.
He said the town would become a ghost town if officials allow buildings to stay in disrepair.
