County puts more emphasis on declining neighborhoods
By Greg Pearson STAFF WRITER

Page Dowdy/Chesterfield Observer The county has ordered the owner of this property on Enon Avenue to tear down this unsafe and unsightly carport. If the owner fails to do so, the county will have the carport demolished and then try to collect the cost from the owner.

County leaders are taking a renewed interest in older communities, believing that being proactive will help prevent further degradation of some property values. The Sustain Our Communities Committee will be asking to update the board of supervisors this summer during an afternoon work session to head off more future problems.

The committee is chaired by Cliff Bickford with staff support headed by Director of Revitalization Tom Jacobson. Speaking to the planning commission last month, Jacobson told them, more than growth, "Sustaining our communities will be our future issue." While Chesterfield adds about 2,000 new homes a year, according to Claritas research in 2006, half of the homes in the county were built before 1985, and 17 percent of those 112,000 homes were built before 1970.

Page Dowdy/Chesterfield Observer Neighbors in Salem Woods have asked the zoning department to determine if this residence on Remora Drive is blighted because of its unkempt condition, including the yard.

Toward that end, Board Chairman Art Warren and Vice Chairman Dan Gecker have asked the county to strengthen its ordinances to deal with blight and unsightly homes and businesses. Commission Chairman Russ Gulley is pressing county departments to rewrite ordinances to prohibit residents from parking in their front yards except on driveways. Gulley has suggested reducing proffers for revitalization efforts in declining areas.

To prevent blight, Jacobson recommended both citizens and the county government be vigilant in maintaining buildings and yards since that often leads to a worsening situation known as the "Broken Window Theory" - one broken window leads to another. Other options include better code enforcement balanced with incentives, new infill development and maintaining neighborhood schools. Though Claritas reported that 81 percent of the homes in the county are owner-occupied, many of the residential problems appear to be rental properties.

Often those housing problems have absentee owners living outside of the area. In this week's issue (page 24), the Building Inspections Department is running a legal notice to demolish an unsafe carport of a home in Enon, where the homeowner is out of the area. The other legal notice refers to an unsafe home on Claypoint Road with an owner who is currently incarcerated. His former residence is also scheduled to be demolished.

The county prefers not to spend taxpayer money to tear down a building because often the cost is not recoverable. Even if there is a lien placed on the property for the demolition cost, the property owner often has additional indebtedness - a mortgage and taxes - which has a higher priority for repayment.

According to Director of Building Inspections Bill Dupler, the process usually stops short of demolition. "Most of the time we're successful in getting the owner to fulfill his responsibility," he said.

To demolish a building, most of which are abandoned and don't have secured doors or windows or might collapse, the owner is notified with two letters before a third letter warns him of a specified date to respond. The final step is the legal notice before action is taken.

Blighted homes don't meet the "threshold of being unsafe and [have] a higher standard of notification," explained Dupler. The owner is notified and asked to provide a plan of correction. If he fails to respond or the county doesn't believe his corrective action is sufficient, the matter goes to the planning commission for a hearing. The commission must agree that the property meets the legal definition in the blight ordinance and decide what is the appropriate remedy. If the property is determined to be blighted, the owner then has a public hearing before the county board. The commission and the board tend to be lenient and grant more time for the corrective action.

Another problem is staffing to enforce county ordinances. Salem Woods residents turned in 19 potential violations recently - 12 of them for abandoned vehicles - and the zoning department reportedly had difficulty responding to the demand. Salem Woods has been very active in improving its community, including setting up a neighborhood Web site.

Even for a large community like Brandermill, which has a $2 million annual budget and a staff of about 20, maintaining the community is a top priority for the 3,700 homeowners. Brandermill usually has two employees assigned to enforcing covenants. Most older neighborhoods don't have paid staff and miss the advantage of having written covenants that specify standards for upkeep of their homes.