Sioux Falls has harsh penalties for violators

By Emilie Rusch, Journal staff

The state’s largest city also has some of the harshest penalties for residents who refuse to keep their properties up to code.

Whether it is building problems or public nuisances, Code Enforcement has the ability to issue $100 civil citations if no effort to fix the problem occurs within 10 to 14 days, code enforcement officer Brad Hartmann said.

Fines ratchet up to $200 after the second 10 to 14 days of no action and to $300 after the third 10 to 14 days. After that, offenders can be ticketed $300 every day until the property is cleaned up.

“We work with people if they’re willing to work with us,” Hartmann said. “The fines are only automatic if they don’t do anything.”

Hartmann said most code enforcement is complaint-driven, but every spring, the city chooses two neighborhoods for proactive clean-up programs.

Residents in the specific areas can then leave any junk out at the curb — including tires, vehicle parts and appliances — for free pickup by street crews formed from volunteers from various city departments.

Afterwards, code enforcement officers survey the neighborhoods looking for any leftover violations that need to be addressed.

In April, Project Neighborhood Improvement/ Complaint Easement and Project Keep Environmental Enhancement Permanent removed 355 truckloads of rubble, eight loads of tires and eight loads of appliances from two neighborhoods, according to the city’s Web site.

“We can only enforce what city ordinance says,” Hartmann said. “Just because one person doesn’t like the color of the curtains, we can’t change that. But if there’s a complaint about a junk car, or the grass is over eight inches or they’re parking on their lawn — which is illegal in Sioux Falls — we investigate it.”

Bismarck: Clean-Up Week helpsThe North Dakota capital has found luck with a citywide junk collection program similar to that in Sioux Falls every spring and fall.

During Clean-Up Week, all city residents can leave whatever trash and junk they have on the curb for free pickup. The fall clean-up was Sept. 21-26, said Mel Fischer, administrator of the city’s Environmental Health Division. The division is part of the Bismarck

Fire Department.

“I drove by a house this morning and saw two complete PCs with four printers on the boulevard, waiting to be picked up, ready to go,” Fischer said. “There is a great awareness of the program.”

Before the spring clean-up, environmental health officers do an annual “spring survey,” a proactive pass through the city to identify and contact property owners about violations. Year-round, Environmental Health also works closely with the city Public Works Department, which acts as a second set of eyes when out doing normal garbage collection.

In the past four years, Bismarck has gained greater authority to deal with overgrown grass and weeds on residential and commercial properties, Fischer said. Neither can be longer than eight inches.

If property owners do not trim their grass by June 1, July 15 and Sept. 1 — the city’s “cut-by” dates — a city contractor will mow it without notifying residents first. This year, the minimum mowing cost is $74 — $64 per hour plus a $10 administrative fee.

The program, which has been generally well-received in the community, has freed the division’s limited staff to spend more time on other code violations, Fischer said.

“We used to get 1,500 calls a year or more. Then, we’d have to go out and verify the call and get a map ready, give it to a contractor, make sure the contractor cut it. Sometimes, it was four trips out to the parcel,” Fischer said.

“Our goal is just to have it done. If it’s done by someone else, that’s great. We’re not interested in making money in this.”