By CHARLES RICHARDS
eParisExtra.com/
Acting city manager Gene Anderson said the City of Paris needs a “clear and easily understood process” that explains how the City of Paris will address substandard structures.
Gene Anderson
“Some sort of flowchart, decision-tree process that spells it out – so that there is no question on what the process is and who’s responsible for each step,” Anderson told Friday’s second meeting of the City Council Task Force on Substandard Structures.
“If we can accomplish that and take that to the council for its approval, I think we would be successful, if that’s all we get done,” said Anderson, himself one of 11 members of the task force.
Mayor AJ Hashmi called for an investigation and created the task force after a downtown building collapsed into the street months after it had been tagged for demolition.
Much of the initial meeting of the task force on Feb. 2 dwelt on what code enforcement did or did not do, leading to the failure to giving timely attention to the building that collapsed.
The focus Friday, and in future meetings, is “to make sure it doesn’t happen again,” said city councilman John Wright, chairman of the task force.
Also on the task force are councilmen Robert Avila and Dr. Richard Grossnickle; Don “Pinky” Wilson and Vicki Ballard from the buildings and standards commission; Arvin Starrett from the historical preservation commission; city attorney Kent McIlyar; and at-large members Bloys Enloe, Keith Flowers and Jean Schweers.
Jean Schweers
Schweers said code enforcement got the blame for doing or not doing things that, according to the municipal code, are the responsibility of the buildings and standings commission, not code enforcement.
“I understand that when you have volunteers working on a commission, a lot falls on the employees of the city, but that needs to be changed in the code. We need to change either what the code is or what we’ve been doing,” she said.
Grossnickle said there needs to be a spreadsheet for each property that comes before the buildings and standards commission.
Each step along the way should be checked off as it is taken care of “so we can keep current and make sure we are not falling apart,” he said.
Avila and Flowers agreed.
“It appears that we get to the buildings and standards commission, and then they get lost in the system at some part. We need a flowchart for each building so we can see where that building is, in the process,” Flowers said.
Bloys Enloe
Enloe said he sees “a need to prioritize.”
“On both sides of town, buildings have burned and just sat there for three years. If a house has burned down, that should come ahead of a house that is not occupied,” he said.
Wright said he would like to see an earlier detection of all substandard structures “so we have a better chance to get them back on the tax roll, rather than taking a lien against them.”
He asked for weekly reports to the city council “on everything in the system, as to where it stands and what’s being done.”
Wright said he’d also like to see people fined as quickly as possible after the need for repair surfaces “so they start feeling a pinch early – not a knockout punch, but something that keeps coming at them.”
Wilson, who is the chairman of the buildings and standards commission, said he sees a need for a structural engineer to certify when buildings need to come down “to get things off high center.”
Wright said he would like for “a few days to digest this” and have another meeting in a week.
It was decided instead to call the next meeting for 11 a.m. on Friday, Feb. 24, following a meeting of the buildings and standards commission that has been called for Monday, Feb. 20.
Members of the task force will be sent the same packet of information that members of the buildings and standards commission will have before them during that meeting.
Vicki Ballard
Anderson addressed another problem raised during the meeting. Enloe inquired about how the city handles complaints about code enforcement or other issues that are brought in by citizens, either in person or by telephone.
He asked how the citizen can check the progress of his complaint.
Anderson said a process has been in place for several years to handle complaints filed into the city’s website. The complaint is given a number and can be tracked on the Internet, Anderson said.
The complaint goes to the proper department, and if it hasn’t been addressed in so many days, the complaint automatically goes to the supervisor, and eventually all the way to the city manager until resolution, Anderson said.
Ballard said that works for her, but what about elderly citizens or others who aren’t computer-savvy?
Anderson said anyone can go to the public library and find a computer person who can walk them through the process.
Ballard said she knows elderly people who wouldn’t do that.
“When someone complains, by phone or in person, why isn’t that entered into the computer at that time by city personnel,” Wilson asked.
Robert Talley
Shawn Napier, the city’s director of engineering, planning and development, said: “That’s already being done in some departments – public works, for example.”
Enloe asked what happens if someone phones or brings in a complaint to code enforcement.
Code enforcement supervisor Robert Talley replied: “We don’t log anything into the computer. I keep a notebook. I enter it into my notebook, go out and look at the property, and send out notices.”
At that point, Anderson turned to Talley and said, “Go ahead and start putting it into the system when you get a complaint” from now on.
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Charles Richards Charles Richards moved to Paris in 2004 after retiring from a 40-year career in journalism – the last 26 years as a news writer and sports writer with The Associated Press in Dallas and Washington, D.C. In mid-2004, The Paris News coaxed him out of retirement, and he began covering the police, court and regional beat for The Paris News. Then in early 2005, he was switched to coverage of a sharply divided Paris City Council. He was appointed by the City Council in 2006 to the 12-member City Charter Review Commission, which extensively rewrote the outmoded document. His writing awards include two first-place awards in statewide competition for feature writing. The most recent was his 2005 story on a Paris doctor’s startling use of leeches in a successful attempt to re-attach a man’s severed ear. Over his career, Richards’ interview subjects include Alabama Gov. George Wallace, President Bill Clinton, President George W. Bush, David Koresh, Arnold Palmer, Muhammad Ali and numerous other political and sports figures. He is an alumnus of Texas Tech, where he was editor of the school newspaper. He lives in Paris with his wife, Barbara, who is retired after 30 years as a teacher and high school counselor.
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