The City Council is looking to improve the appearance of its neighborhoods by reexamining the City's junk car ordinance. Although nothing has been approved yet, the Council was presented with potential changes to the ordinance at its meeting on Tuesday, February 17th. Before anything is official, the Council will discuss the issues at hand during their Work Session meeting on Monday, March 2nd, followed by a public hearing (date to be determined) to let citizens voice opinions in favor of and against the proposed ordinance changes.
Although residents living within City limits will still be able to have a maximum of two junk cars on their property, the new ordinance would require all junk cars to be concealed with an all-weather, fitted cover – not a tarp or other loose garment held down with heavy objects. Like the original ordinance, the adjustments maintain that cars may not be in the front of the owner’s property.
Also significant are new regulations that would allow the City to tow extraneous and hazardous vehicles from private property at the cost of the owner. Once a property is tagged, either for having too many, having hazardous, or having abandoned automobiles, the property owner would receive a notice explaining that they have a period of seven days in which to remove the vehicle in question. At the end of the voluntary compliance period, if the vehicle has not been removed, the City will hire a towing contractor to remove the automobile from the property. Property owners who wish to appeal the removal of the vehicle to the City Council will receive instructions on how to do so before the vehicle is towed. Should the City have to tow the vehicle from the owner’s property, a post-towing notification would be sent to the owner describing the vehicle removed, where it was towed, the specific violation and reason for towing, the procedure for retrieving the vehicle, and how to request a probable cause hearing. At the end of the ordinance are five exceptions that prevent vehicles from being towed if they meet certain criteria.
Many other cities in the region have ordinances similar to the one proposed to the City Council, and the language of the ordinance comes from an outline provided in a similar State Statute. All of the guidelines for automobiles considered junk, hazardous, and abandoned can be found in the same State Statute. The Council is favorable to the new regulations because “the goal is to clean up the City,” said Mayor Wall.