After a year of blight-fighting, town officials seem to have gotten past their initial counteroffensive and settled into an ongoing war of attrition against the human tendency to let things slide — downward, generally, from disrepair to deterioration to downright disaster area.
“I think it’s worked. It’s worked very well,” First Selectman Rudy Marconi said.
“Probably the worst properties — on Branchville Road, Silver Spring Lane, maybe a couple of others — all have been addressed.”
Since the Blight Prevention Board began meeting in June 2014, its record shows 23 properties have been investigated.
Under the process created by the town blight law that voters approved last year, investigations are prompted by citizen complaints.
Of the properties investigated, close to two-thirds — 14 of the 23 — were determined not to be blight, under the statute’s rigorous standards, according to the Blight Prevention Board’s records.
Six properties were determined to qualify as blight, and have since been cleaned up.
Three properties had been determined to be blight, and were still in the blight board’s process, as of the June monthly blight prevention board meeting.
One new complaint has come in since then, according to First Selectman Rudy Marconi.
After 20 years
There’s no question, in Marconi’s view, that the ordinance had been helpful in getting owners to address the six properties that were cleaned up.
“Some of those properties, we have been — through our building official, or health department, even the fire marshal — for 20 years trying to get a hold of the owners to address specific concerns, relative to blight,” Marconi said.
“And without the ordinance we would never have been able to clean these properties up,” he said. “What it does is it brings people to the table.”
Zoning Enforcement Officer Richard Baldelli serves on the Blight Prevention Board, along with Marconi, Fire Marshal David Lathrop, Building Inspector Bill Reynolds and Director of Health Ed Briggs.
He thinks the law is working.
“It’s been helpful for cleaning up properties that really did need to be cleaned up,” Baldelli said.
Even-handed
He pointed out that there’d been at least as many determinations of “no blight” by the board — leading to no town action against the owners — as there were votes to pursue action against properties that the board thought were blight, under the law’s standards.
“I think the board has done a very even-handed job of looking at the properties and the complaints, and making a determination of blight based on the ordinance,” Baldelli said.
“There’s been properties we’ve looked at that maybe we felt were messy, but didn’t meet the definition of blight, therefore a determination of ‘no blight’ was issued,” Baldelli said.
Most of property owners who did end up having to clean up their properties weren’t dragged to it kicking and screaming — it just took some official town action to get them started doing something about the situation.
“I think most of the people we’ve spoken to, that the properties were determined to be blight, weren’t that surprised,” Baldelli said.
With the town was reasonable, the offenders were cooperative.
“Once they found the board would work with them, timewise, to address the issues, it’s been a relatively easy process,” Baldelli said.
Things seem to be slowing down, some.
There was “a spate of complaints” when the law first went into effect, Baldelli said “and now it seems to be lessening.”
Marconi agreed.
“The initial 15 to 20 complaints that came in, came in relatively quickly after the passage of the ordinance.”
Patient, reasonable
A critic of the law, local land use attorney Bob Jewell, agreed that the town has been doing a good job with it so far.
“It seems to be working. I was against it — and I’m still kind of against it,” Jewell said.
He has represented one of the property owners who was the subject of a complaint, he said.
“In my experience,” Jewell said, “…the blight board has been very patient and very reasonable.
“If someone has issues — whether it’s a health issue, or financial issues, or whatever — from what I hear, and from my experience, they’ve been patient and understanding.”
But Jewell said he still has concerns. Ridgefield’s blight law may be working well because it’s being reasonably enforced by the current blight board — people who remember the town’s extensive debate about the law, the concerns about overzealous enforcement that were raised, and the ambivalence even many supporters had about it.
But there’s no guarantee that will always be well enforced, he said.
“I worry about down the road, when Rudy’s gone, and Richard’s gone, and everyone who remembers why we did it in the first place is gone, and we just have the law on the books,” Jewell said.
Where they are?
The six properties that were the subject of complaints under the blight law, and have now been cleaned up, were on Ashbee Lane, Branchville Road, Florida Hill Road, Nod Hill Road, Old Mill Road and Oscaleta Road, according to the Blight Prevention Board’s records.
The three properties that were determined to be blight, and are in the process but aren’t yet all cleaned up, are on Silver Spring Lane, Wilridge Road, and Catoonah Street, the records say.
The 14 properties that were complained about, but weren’t determined to be true blight by the board, were on Blue Ridge Road, Fire Hill Road, Lakeside Drive, Lounsbury Road, Madeline Drive, Mamanasco Road, Marcardon Avenue, Peaceable Ridge Road, Pine Mountain Road, Ramapoo Road, Rolling Ridge Road, Sylvan Drive, Soundview Road and Walnut Grove Road.
Fines
Marconi said that the property owners who have been through the process have been fairly cooperative.
“Each and every one has realized that it was something, yes, it needs to be done,” Marconi said.
While a couple of property owner had been fined, he said, none had to deal with the mounting daily fines that are the blight ordinance’s big gun.
“Yeah, there were a couple that were issued a couple of fines in the neighborhood of $100,” he said.
“…We have yet to really have to levy the ultimate fine, which is I believe is $100 a day…
“I think the bottom line is when people realize there is a financial consequence, they would prefer to avoid any further financial levy and begin to address the property.”
Whatever else might be said about the blight law, with 60% of complaints determined not to be bad enough to warrant a blight determination and town intervention, the first year’s operations suggest that overzealous enforcement isn’t much of a problem as yet.
“Some people may have been surprised,” Baldelli said.
Perhaps some consider the board too lenient.
“I have no input from the people who submitted complaints and we made a determination of ‘no blight’ — I have no idea what they’re saying about us,” Baldelli said.
“When you use the word ‘blight’ in a vacuum, it can be very subjective,” he said.
“However, in Ridgefield the blight ordinance is, I believe, a well-written ordinance and the blight board is truly following the ordinance — which gets rid of a lot of subjectivity that could be associated with using the word ‘blight’ in a vacuum.
“To some people it could be just a paper cup on the lawn,” Baldelli said
“It definitely needs to be more than just messy.”
A pile
The blighted properties have a wide array of problems, ranging from neglected repairs to accumulations of possessions that appear to be awaiting a purpose — often in varying states of decay.
“There’s been stuff I’ve looked at and I’ve photographed from the road that I couldn’t tell you what it was,” Baldelli said.
“Some people just have a tendency to collect things. And to those people it has a value, whether it’s now or in the future, and to me it looks like a pile of metal and wood.”
The blight ordinance is quite specific, suggesting conditions that might merit or contribute to a finding that a property is blighted.
“The following factors,” it says, “may be considered in determining whether it is not being adequately maintained:
“(1) Multiple missing, broken, or boarded windows or doors.
“(2) Collapsing or missing walls, roof, or floors.
“(3) Seriously damaged or missing siding.
“(4) A structurally faulty foundation.
“(5) Excessive amounts of garbage or trash.
“(6) Abandoned motor vehicles not registered with the Commissioner of Motor Vehicles pursuant to the Connecticut General Statutes … including cars, trucks, boats and motorcycles, or other inoperable machinery on the premises visible from the street or any adjoining property.
“(7) Rodent harborage and/or infestation.
“(8) Unrepaired fire or water damage.
“(9) Parking lots left in a state of disrepair or abandonment.”
Five people
Baldelli noted that the judgment to enforce the blight law against a property isn’t left to one person.
“There’s a distinction the board makes. And it’s five people making the distinction — its not just one person’s opinion. It’s a ‘majority rules’ type thing.”
Usually, there’s broad agreement among board members by the time there’s a vote.
“I think there’s only been one or two split votes — generally they are unanimous,” Baldelli said.
“You add up the years of experience on the board, whether it’s doing the building code, or the Department of Health, or fire code, or Rudy’s experience, we’ve all been doing this a long time.”
Ridgefield’s blight ordinance also creates a blight Citation Hearing Appeals Board that citizens can go to in order to challenge the decisions of the Blight Prevention Board.
“They’ve never had to meet,” Marconi said.
They may soon, though.
“We are working with one property owner now, who intends to file an appeal of a fine that was levied for non-compliance,” Marconi said.
Concerns
Still, attorney Jewell is uneasy about the blight ordinance. It seems an invitation for people to try to tell their neighbors how to live.
“I know there are safeguards in our law,” he said.
“Once you open the gates, there’s a chance that it will happen here: People will just — if you don’t cut your grass for three weeks people will be complaining…
“As time goes on, people forget the original intent of a regulation.”
Jewell said there are towns with strict regulations like the blight law where “code enforcement” has become a weapon unhappy neighbors try to use against each other, calling in complaints.
“That hasn’t happened here yet,” he said. “I have the fear that could happen here.”
Although he agrees it’s being well enforced so far, the blight ordinance just doesn’t sit well with Jewell — a practicing land use attorney, accustomed to dealing with lengthy and exacting rules and regulations.
“It’s very carefully crafted. It’s been looked at by lawyers and the Board of Selectmen and everything, but it still makes me nervous,” he said.
“As they used to say about Greenwich … if there’s a dispute between neighbors, the first call you get is from a lawyer.”
This house on Catoonah is one of three considered to be blight that have not yet been cleaned up. —Macklin Reid photo
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