The city of Burlington will begin enforcing a junk car ban on Saturday. Although some city officials think that junk cars are a problem, a city councilman thinks the ban isn’t needed.
The junk car ban, passed in June, enables the city to tow junked, abandoned or hazardous motor vehicles that are within the city limits. Greg Turner, crime prevention specialist with the Burlington Police Department, said that the number of junked cars is pretty low.
“Junk cars have never been an issue,” Turner said. “We could ride around town and I don’t know if I’d see any.”
Councilmember Celo Faucette said that the ordinance was created to improve the appearance of Burlington.
“Aesthetically it has been (a problem),” Faucette said.
Despite this apparent aesthetic problem, Faucette estimated a low number of cars that are viewable to the public.
“I wouldn’t know what the number is, but you may see one or two (junked cars),” Faucette said.
David Beal, assistant director for planning services for Burlington, confirmed that the most junked cars are located on parts of personal property that aren’t viewable to the public.
“There is no accurate count available, but it is safe to say there are hundreds (of junked cars),” Beal said. “Most of the vehicles are in residential areas and can be found anywhere on the property, but mainly in the rear yard.”
The location of these cars is, in part, why Faucette voted against the ordinance. Faucette’s was the only “no” vote. He said that “junk” is too subjective of a work to put into a law.
“Again it goes back to what is junk to the city and what is junk to that resident,” Faucette said. “I think laws and everything is what this country is based on, but sometimes I think we can go a little too far on somebody’s personal rights. If there is a problem with it, then yes come and tell me that there is a problem with it, but don’t have laws that curtail property rights. I know we’re trying to take care of our city and make it aesthetically pleasing, but sometimes I think we can find a better way than passing an ordinance to do that.”
Despite the fact that the large majority of junked cars can’t be seen, Beal feels that the ban will be good for the community. Beal sees junk cars as a problem beyond aesthetics.
“Junked motor vehicles have been a problem in that they can be unsightly in neighborhoods, they may be hazardous, they may negatively impact property values by being allowed to remain, and there are environmental concerns due to leaking fluids,” Beal said.
Although Beal has these other concerns about the junked cars, this law is only enforced via community complaints, which will be largely based on how the cars look.
Faucette said a hotline for a citywide community junk car watch has been set up so that anyone, mostly neighbors with complaints, can call in the location of junked vehicles,.
“We just don’t have the manpower (of the police force) to go out and look for abandoned vehicles and junked vehicles and the sort,” Faucette said. “We leave it on the community to police in this area.”
The junk car ban hotline is an element of Connecting Burlington Communities, which was designed to clean up and improve the quality of life in Burlington. Other issues CBC deals with are graffiti, illegally dumped items and litter.
To properly inform the community of the upcoming enforcement of the ban, Turner plans on notifying all the individual community watch groups of Burlington.
Even though he plans on emailing almost 50 groups, Turner said he does not foresee the hotline being very active.
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