Joliet listing vacant homes
By Bob Okon
bokon@stmedianetwork.com
Nov 18, 2010 08:40PM
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JOLIET — The number of vacant houses in Joliet is close to a thousand, and city building inspectors want to make sure they keep track of them.
The city of Joliet is in the process of creating a “Vacant Property Registry,” which would require that houses left uninhabited for 90 days be listed at City Hall.
The idea has been talked about for months. But the city council’s land use committee on Wednesday agreed to send the proposal to the full council for a vote.
The ordinance will be aimed at keeping track of foreclosed houses that might go unkept and vandalized without someone keeping track of them. City legal staff will write up an ordinance modeled after a similar registry in Chicago.
David Mackley, director of inspections for Joliet, said the city is keeping a list already as it tries to keep track of houses that go into foreclosure. “I think I’m up to 975 properties,” Mackley said.
The registry would require that the owner of a vacated property register with the city at a fee of $100 and include contact information for emergencies. Owners would be required to maintain the outside of the property to keep it presentable. Any boards used on windows would have to be painted brown or the color of the house.
Mackley said the registry could be helpful in avoiding situations in which the city first learns about a vacated property because it has become a nuisance in the neighborhood.
“We’ll go out there and the grass is a foot high,” he said.
Tom Joseph with the Three Rivers Association of Realtors cautioned the committee to define the terms of a vacant house carefully so as not to include such homes as those of retirees who go to Florida for the winter months.
City Attorney Jeff Plyman said he will consult with Joseph and others concerned about the new rules before drawing up the proposal that will go to the full city council for a vote.
But Plyman said the registry is likely to be a list of foreclosed properties.
“It’s normally going to be a foreclosure,” he said, “because who else abandons property?”
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