Pubdate: Sun, 09 Sep 2007
Source: Palestine Herald Press (TX)
Copyright: 2007, The Palestine Herald Press.
Contact:  http://www.palestineherald.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2487
Author: Beth Foley

TAKING BACK THE NEIGHBORHOODS

City Code Officials, Police Work Together To Clean Up  The Streets

PALESTINE -- From the curb, the small, abandoned frame  house had the
look of one that had seen better days --  weeds and dirt competing for
space in the front yard, a  dirty, broken commode sitting upright,
discarded near  the front porch, old clothes scattered nearby,
graffiti  sprayed on the carport.

In the back, piles of trash were heaped behind the  house, creating a
refuge for rats, flies and  mosquitoes.

Flanked by interim police chief Larry Coutorie and  officers Melvin
Hill and James Lewis, city Director of  Development Code Warren Oakley
and code enforcement  officer Clydell McPeak carefully walked around
the  property, noting where trash had been moved and what  remained in
violation of city code.

Thursday morning's visit to the house was the second in  two weeks,
and one of several made over the past month  with police
accompaniment. During the first code  enforcement visit to the
property, Oakley, McPeak and  accompanying police officers found
discarded hypodermic  needles scattered inside the house, evidence of
drug  use.

At other stops Thursday, paint peeled from old wooden  houses, old
cars sat scattered in yards, trash piled  against fences, old washers
and dryers sat rusting in  yards near where children could play.

The visits are part of a new effort to enforce city  laws regarding
overgrown lots and junk vehicles, as  well as unsafe structures and
trash creating health  hazards, officials said.

In the first two weeks, officials cited 30 people for  various
violations, Oakley said.

Property owners are given 10 days to correct the  violation or face
fines and court action.

While code enforcement officials make the majority of  their visits
unaccompanied, the police department  became involved after officials
became concerned about  their safety with some property known to be in
  violation, Coutorie said.

"We got together and were trying to figure out what to  do about known
drug houses, where people are selling or  using," Coutorie said. "The
code enforcement people  were pretty reluctant to go enforce code
rules for fear  of being assaulted.

"We decided to get a couple of officers to go along. We  let them do
their code enforcement work and just stand  by."

Mayor Carolyn Salter said she didn't want to see city  employees
assaulted for doing their jobs, something she  said had happened in
other places.

"The police are going with them to protect them,"  Salter said. "There
have been a couple of code officers  shot around the state."

Not all of the police-backed visits involve drug  houses.

During the first Thursday, code enforcement officials  cited a number
of abandoned cars and found one house  with an open sewer in the yard,
Coutorie said.

During the second week of Thursday visits, he said,  city officials
stopped to inquire about a property with  two junked cars in the yard
and found a man who didn't  live there asleep inside the house.

Several of the properties visited over the past four  weeks have had
pit bulls, sometimes chained to trees or  under old cars.

"These are the situations we're seeing," Oakley said.  "We're seeing
huge amounts of pit bull dogs. One house  had 12 adult dogs and
several puppies. We're seeing  five to that many."

Another property had at least 53 old cars and trucks  parked side by
side in long rows, some of the them  dating to the 1950s. The owner
had repaired vehicles  and they had accumulated over the years, Oakley
said.

In that case, the property owner agreed to find a car  crushing
company to come crush and remove the vehicles,  he said.

"That way they would crush them and pay him," Oakley  said. "A lot of
them were his. He'd buy them to fix up  and sell. He's disabled and
not able to work on the  vehicles anymore."

While that example marked the extreme, plenty of other  property
around the city has become home to rusting,  long dead cars and
trucks, he said.

"It's not just one location," Oakley said. "It's not  unusual to see
four or five abandoned junk vehicles in  people's yards. They've got
to go. They've got to keep  the vehicles operational."

By city law, junked vehicles visible to the public --  not kept inside
of a closed garage, for instance -- and  not current on their state
registration and inspection  may be cited and the owner given 10 days
to correct the  problem.

Many times, attention drawn by junk vehicles has  revealed other
problems, Oakley said.

"We've got all kinds of situations," Oakley said. "We  ask people who
owns a vehicle and a lot of times,  they're not the owners. If (the
owners) don't take care  of it, we'll cause that (removal of the
vehicle) to  happen."

The burden lies with the property owner to fix the  problem, he
said.

"We're placing it on the property owner to get the  violations
corrected," Oakley said. "It will be the  property owner's
responsibility to correct."

Code officials aren't trying to be unfair to anyone, he  said. They're
trying to encourage residents to take  care of what they have, for
their own sake and for the  sake of their neighbors.

"It's like people have just given up," Oakley said.  "We've got to
(get) respect back in the community.  We've got people in Palestine
living in houses with  tarps on the roofs. Their houses are in
absolute  disrepair.

"Not only is it hurting them but it hurts their  neighbors. It hurts
the value of the community. That  blight is going to leave."

Workshops are being planned to help homeowners learn  how to properly
perform home repair, rather than do  something that will lead to more
damage, he said.

In the short time that the program has been under way,  it's beginning
to have a positive impact, officials  said. Property owners have begun
to correct problems  and others have taken notice.

"While we're out doing this, neighbors are out of their  houses on
their cell phones," Oakley said. "We've  gotten calls from neighbors
in support, saying finally  something has been done.

"People have got a choice -- clean up or move on. It's  not the first
time this has been done somewhere -- it's  just the first time in
Palestine. The City of Henderson  is very pro-active. They're doing
basically the same  thing."

Regardless of the violation, officials mean business.

"This is another tool for community policing. This  program is
designed to get the drug dealers, users and  people who do not follow
the health, safety and  building codes to clean up their act, comply
with our  laws or leave," Salter said.

Oakley agreed.

"There's a horrendous number of people in Palestine who  absolutely
neglect any and all regulations the city  has," he said. "This is zero
tolerance. We're not  playing."
- ---
MAP posted-by: Derek