Vacant property fines could put Belleville in real estate business
Belleville has a problem with vacant properties, and it's gotten worse since 2010.
“Nobody wants to live next door to abandoned buildings,” said Maggie Ausmer, who lives across from a vacant apartment building at 4 N. 96th St.
But there are vacant properties because Belleville is losing population. Lost population means lost tax revenue.
So city leaders want to stop vacancies by requiring a $25,000 bond on a property? They think $250 to $500 a day fines will encourage folks to live in the city?
Maybe. But then maybe the city with our region's most intrusive housing regulations is adding more regulations to the pile that have not stopped the vacancy rates from growing or more people from leaving. If you've been regulating housing for decades and are still losing population, is anyone in the city looking at whether the existing housing regulations are causing or aggravating the exodus?
Going the punitive route with property owners might make for good politics, but this system also sounds loaded with politics and exemptions.
Aldermen get to nominate vacant properties. Jane and Joe Average can't call in without filtering their issue through an alderman?
Exemptions are built in for properties being sold, being renovated, when occupants are in Florida for the winter, where the government is involved in the rehab or when the property is in probate like the mayor's mom's place. What's left, especially if any other politicians add exemptions because they have some empathy thanks to personal experience?
Plus, why isn't the city housing department using the ordinances and tools it already has to prevent vacancies from becoming derelict eyesores? If they aren't staying atop "problem properties" now, you have to wonder how well they will do adding "political priority problem properties" to their responsibilities.
Alderman Raffi Ovian pointed to those apartments near Maggie Ausmer as an example of the vacancy issue. It was a poor example.
The apartments were only vacant for nine months. There is a new owner actively rehabilitating the building. It meets the exemptions the proposed ordinance outlines.
Yes, Belleville, there is a problem. A sledgehammer may not be the right tool to fix it, and the city may fine its way into becoming the owner of a whole lot of crumbling properties with demolition costs well above the $138,000 a year that population loss has cost it.
This story was originally published June 18, 2018 at 12:30 PM with the headline "Vacant property fines could put Belleville in real estate business."