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Benzie County Commissioners Repeal International Property Maintenance Code They Passed the Previous Month

 

On the County Commissioner Meeting of February 19, 2013 the Benzie County Commissioners passed 6-1 an innocent looking ordinance without any comment.  The vote occurred during the department head reports portion of the meeting and was not on the agenda. After a presentation by Robert Theobald and Richard Fast about the so-called “question mark” building in Honor, Homestead Township commissioner Frank Walterhouse made a motion to adopt Ordinance 2013-001, according to the Elberta Alert.

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Subsequently the new property maintenance code was published in the paper. the Record Patriot, as declared and several people took notice.  Here was that ordinance:  Benzie-ordinance-no-2013-001.  This declared that the county would be following the  2009 International Property Maintenance Code.

According to county administrator Chris Olson, Olson and a committee consisting of Frank Walterhouse (Homestead), Glen Rineer (Benzonia), county attorney Richard Figura, and building official Bert Gale recommended adoption of the code. This committee also “tailored” the ordinance at the time the code was adopted at the meeting, by filling in blanks in the code dealing with the maximum height for grass, the range of fines for noncompliance ($100 to $500 a day), the enforcement officer (building official Bert Gale), and the dates for seasonal rules such as grass height (May 1 to November 1) and the period during which a dwelling must be heated to 68 degrees (October 1–May 1).

According to a letter from Figura, violation of the ordinance was to be considered a civil infraction. The fines will be levied as a lien on the property owner’s tax bill, and other penalties could include eviction, property seizure, and/or demolition.

Correspondence from Richard Figura read at the meeting said condemnation and demolition of properties in violation would be a “last resort.”

Reached by phone last week, Olson said he was aware of a “lively discussion” having taken place in Blaine Township and Thompsonville about the code adoption. “The code is fairly commonsense provisions,” he said, and he doesn’t expect it will be tweaked any further. “This is not anything extraordinary. No provisions are unreasonable. It’s basic property maintenance [guidelines] for a habitable structure.”

Others consider it anything but basic.

In a phone interview last Monday, Don Tanner, commission chair and representative for District 7 (Blaine, Gilmore, Joyfield, Weldon, Thomsonville) explained his solo no vote. “This is an example of too much government power reaching into people’s day-to-day lives. This is like trying to enforce subdivision rules on a rural community. I don’t think there’s a house in this county that would pass unless it was built yesterday and it still might not,” Tanner said. “I don’t think my fellow commissioners read that code and understood how perverse it really is.”

Mark Evans, a Joyfield Township trustee also reached by phone, concurred: “It’s such an overreach. They say it’ll only be [enforced] as needed. But all the laws are there and if somebody in the future wanted to be a real pain they could be. Practically every building in the county would be in violation to some degree. It just amazes me. Why would we want to take on some international code?”

The detailed ordinance, which Olson said has been adopted by other communities in Michigan and around the world, addresses such things as peeling exterior and interior paint, cracked interior plaster, roof leaks, number and position of interior lighting fixtures, minimum room sizes, and proper garbage disposal in addition to construction materials, structural load, plumbing, egress, and electrical hookups. The code applies to existing structures as well as new construction, and was considered in force as of the newspaper publication of the notice of adoption.

Tanner and Evans both cited the strict verbiage against rodents. “If you’ve got a crack in your foundation big enough for a mouse to get in, you’re in violation,” said Evans.  Nods again to the Elberta Alert.

But Enough people finally took notice and came to the meeting this month, two days ago

BENZIE COUNTY -- More than 100 people showed up at the Benzie County Commission meeting Tuesday to protest a property code law.

It’s called the International Property Maintenance Code and Benzie County Commissioners thought it was the "legal weapon" they needed to get rid of old buildings in the County. But instead, it created a whole lot of controversy amongst community members.

But not all the commissioners read the 35 page code before passing it into law.  However, Benzie County Commission Chair Donald Tanner read it and didn't like what he saw. Tanner says, “There were not just structural issues, there were issues of grass cutting and paint chipping --things that, the code went too far into peoples lives for me to support it.”

Doug Holmes, of Frankfort, talks about his opposition to a Benzie County property maintenance code at a county Board of Commis-sioners meeting Tuesday.

With the heavy opposition at Tuesday’s meeting, the Benzie County Commissioners took the law off the books and that means people in downtown Honor will still have several old, run-down buildings to look at in the community.

Commissioners say they will continue to look for ways to deal with buildings that need to be either torn down or developed.  They say one solution is to possibly use Brownfield Redevelopment money.  Here's a bit more details on that meeting, with the people's voices highlighted.  Good job Benziers!

Those opposed to a Benzie County property code ordinance raised their hands in a show of opposition to the ordinance, which would have required county residents to maintain a satisfactory upkeep of their property. The Benzie County Board of Commissioners killed the ordinance after a significant public