The owners of deteriorating buildings in Baton Rouge now face a city-parish armed with a new tool to address properties that are deemed hazards to the public.
The Metro Council earlier this month adopted the International Property Maintenance Code for residential properties, a model code that establishes minimum standards for structural conditions, lighting, ventilation, sanitation, and fire safety of residential and commercial properties.
The ordinance by Councilman Darryl Hurst, which takes effect in a little under 6 months, will allow the Department of Development to begin rapidly addressing code violations that may not be severe enough to warrant a condemnation by the city-parish. Hurst said he hopes this will enable the city-parish to fine “slumlords,” or a landlord who does maintain a residential property.
“It literally kills the ability to support slumlords and to be a bad neighbor in our communities,” Hurst said.
Overgrown brush that attracts rodents, hoarding and other more minor building hazards were previously addressed by the city-parish through the 19th Judicial District Court, a costly and time-consuming process that hamstrung DOD into adjudicating only about 10 of the worst reported cases per year, DOD Director Rachael Lambert said.
Under the new ordinance, residents can report code violations through 311 and DOD will now adjudicate any violations through administrative court, which is already done for blight. This will enable DOD to adjudicate up to 30 cases a month and address more minor code violations, Building Official Blake Steiner said.
Property owners found in violation of the requirements can be fined up to $500.
“Our goal isn’t to make this a profit source for the city, it’s to say to the slumlords that they can either use the money to pay us or make the repairs, and we’d prefer they make the repairs than pay the city,” Hurst said.
The new ordinance will give the city-parish more teeth when enforcing building codes by adding an avenue for enforcement below condemning a property.
“We needed to be able to increase our volume,” Steiner said. “By having this administrative court process, we now have an avenue that we can handle that volume and resolve these issues.”
Addressing blighted properties has been a stated priority for the city-parish for much of Mayor-President Sharon Weston Broome’s time in office, and those efforts have ramped up over the last year with the use of federal COVID-19 rescue money.
DOD has spent about a quarter of its $4.5 million in American Rescue Plan Act funds on grass and weed removal, junk and debris collection and condemnations and demolition, according to the department’s November budget presentation.
Contractors with DOD have responded to those issues at hundreds of properties this year and 70 condemned buildings have been demolished, according to the budget presentation.
The Metro Council during its Tuesday meeting also approved a rewrite of the city-parish’s building codes in order to make them easier for developers and property owners to understand when applying for building permits.
DOD will complete a parishwide survey of blighted properties by the end of the year that will help the department when applying for grants to address dilapidated areas of the parish, Lambert said.