From the air and on the ground – and also from behind a desk – the City of Buffalo plans to attack neglected commercial properties, starting with 250 of the "worst of the worst" locations, city officials said Saturday.
"We simply will not allow problem properties to exist," Mayor Byron W. Brown said in announcing the initiative.
"We're going to go after them. We're not going to put up with it anymore," said James Comerford, commissioner of the Department of Permit and Inspection Services. "What we're trying to do here is to save our older buildings, and we have to force the owners who sit on them and speculate to start moving on them."
The crackdown comes two and half months after the emergency demolition of a Civil War-era building on Ellicott Street.
Preservationists have called that building's demolition a result of "a system-level failure" by city government to hold absentee, out-of-town property owners accountable and not doing enough to force them to maintain their holdings. Several weeks after the demolition, Brown promised a "tough, tough plan" for going after neglectful building owners.
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On Saturday he unveiled the plan. Brown described the code enforcement measures as a "more robust and faster approach" to inspecting and stabilizing commercial properties.
The initiative involves:
- Identifying unstable structures earlier and conducting blitz inspections.
- Creating an administrative hearing process to take place before going to Housing Court.
- Increasing fines.
The city will take a "predictive approach" to inspections by using information from all city departments, including the recent reassessment that included an assessment of building conditions, to identify those buildings most in need of inspection. The city also has started using video filmed by the Erie County Sheriff's helicopter to inspect roofs and is looking at using drones for inspections.
"What you see on the ground, you don't always see in the air," Comerford said. "Unfortunately, compromise usually starts on the roofs, with holes in the roofs. Everything usually starts from the top."
Using that information, as well as referrals from Council members and the public, the city came up with a list of 250 properties that will be continuously updated. The properties will be immediately assessed with inspection blitzes that started with 30 buildings Saturday.
Brown said the owners will be notified they are on the list, but that "in most cases, if not all cases, the owners of those properties should already know that their properties are in poor condition."
Brown also will introduce legislation in the next several weeks to add a fine of $500 a day for owners of vacant buildings who have not filed the required statement of intent for the future use of the building. He also wants to increase the fines Housing Court can impose from $1,500 to $2,000.
The administrative hearing would be held within 27 days of the inspection, which will allow the city to intervene earlier, officials said.
If the owner has not complied or shown a willingness to comply, the city will request an expedited hearing in Housing Court.
Video below was taken by the Erie County Sheriff's helicopter of the former Goodwill distribution center at 207 Guilford St. that shows the collapsed roof:
