Mayor & Husband ignore 5 day violation notice from City
In our last edition we reported the building pictured above at 218 N. Main has been boarded up with black painted plywood since November of 2003 in violation of City ordinances. We brought this matter to the attention of the City Administration several months ago and nothing was done. Several hours after our paper hit the streets last week we received the following e-mail from Tom Ashburn the Director of Community Development for the City.
We checked this out yesterday and confirmed your report and a complaint we received from a businessman on N. Main earlier this week, that one of the glass panels has been replaced with a plywood panel that is painted black. We also checked our records to see if any notices had been sent on this in the past and they have not. As you may know, the City's Code of Ordinances does allow temporary boarding of windows for up to 90 days and then the boards must be removed and the windows must contain glazing which is free from cracks or holes. Based on your complaint as well as the other complaint we received, we have reason to believe that the board has in fact been up longer than the 90 days permitted by the ordinance. Therefore, we are sending out a letter today to the property owners notifying them of this violation and giving them 5 days to take corrective action. The vast majority of code violations are handled on a complaint basis. We were not aware of this violation prior to your complaint and the complaint received earlier this week. Thank you for bringing it to our attention.
We checked the building Thursday evening, and the window has not been brought into compliance with City codes. The Mayor took an oath of office to uphold the ordinances of the City and in November she will be in violation of that oath for two years.
