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County code enforcement looks back on 2020, ahead to future

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Looking into such complaints as dry weeds and other fire hazards, roosters and building without permits, Gila County’s Code Enforcement Division covers a lot of territory. The division, with offices in Globe and Payson, is part of the county’s Community Development Department. In a Nov. 17 meeting, county supervisors were briefed on some of its progress this year and its plans moving ahead.

To help tackle the weed issue, for example, Code Enforcement will start holding monthly hearings from March through May; hearings are now every other month.

“We get a lot of complaints down in the Tonto Basin/Roosevelt area in the spring months when those weeds dry out,” said Community Development Director Scott Buzan. “We’ve had a couple of fires down there that got really close to those communities, so folks get very concerned of the neighbors that don’t maintain their property.

“We’ve noticed that on the every-other-month schedule, by the time we issue the 30-day letter or the violation and have scheduled it to go to the next hearing, the weeds have been there for two months or so,” he added. “That was unsatisfactory to the neighbors; they’re worried about it today and want it taken care of immediately – and I understand that.

“Now we’ve moved it to a 15-day letter for weeds, and then we can get it right to the hearing officer within the next few weeks to 30 days depending on how it plays out. Once we tell them that it can go to hearing, that seems to motivate them, if they’re out of state, to hire someone local to go take care of the issue.”

From their offices in Globe and Payson, the county’s two code enforcement specialists, Bill Hanna and Rebecca Borowski, follow up on complaints ranging from junk to lighting ordinance violations. From January through September, the division opened 242 complaint cases and closed 232, including some from before 2020. At the end of September the division had 104 active cases. “On the average we open 20-30 a month and close the same amount. It’s almost like a rolling average,” said Buzan.

In those first nine months of 2020, the county was awarded $20,800 in code enforcement fines and $19,812 in fines was paid.

In Globe, junk was the most common complaint (35) from January through September; next came fire hazards/weeds at 21. Most of the Payson’s complaints (89) were for building without a permit. “The biggest thing I hear is that they didn’t know they needed a permit, or their neighbor said they didn’t need one,” said Borowski, who works from the Payson office covering the county from the Roosevelt area north.

Buzan said “junk” could be almost anything but household trash, which is handled by the County Health Department. “We have to be careful; you could have a pile of copper wire the neighbor thinks is junk and this gentleman thinks is his retirement. We have to be very delicate in the way we approach it. We’re not necessarily asking them to remove it, but to do something with it so that it’s more presentable to the neighbors. We try not to go in heavy-handed; we’re not like that.”

Code Enforcement notifies property owners of complaints by knocking on their doors or leaving a red tag, and also sends 30-day notices when an issue is found. Borowski said property owners were usually cooperative. “We communicate with them and they move in a forward direction toward compliance.” When that doesn’t happen, the case is taken to the hearing officer.

“It’s up to the hearing officer; we make a recommendation and, based on our hearing officer rules of procedure, there is a maximum fine that we could allot. We try to be reasonable with it,” said Buzan.

This year Borowski, through a scholarship from Arizona Building Officials, attended the Southwest Leadership Program through Eller Executive Education at the University of Arizona. “It had classes on leadership – team building, negotiating and building virtual teams,” she said. “This year it was completely online; this was their first year doing the classes virtually.” The program also had a segment on personality types that included dealing with difficult people, an important skill in code enforcement.

Hanna, based in Globe, handles cases up to the Roosevelt area as well as in Winkelman and Hayden, to whom the county offers inspection services.

Code Enforcement is also looking at structures that could qualify for the county’s clean and lien program. Under clean and lien, the county has set aside money to clean properties when a violation goes uncorrected; they then place a lien on the property for the cost. “In theory, when the property sells someday we would be line to get repaid,” said Buzan. “It’s not a quick process because of property rights; it probably takes three to six months to go through. You have to move slowly and follow the law.”

Educating the public is among Borowski’s and Hanna’s bigger responsibilities, taking phone calls to answer their questions. “It’s a skill; you work with people and try to find out what exactly they’re doing, have done or want to do. They’re very hesitant a lot of times to give you additional information, but you can draw it out of them. You do that by being pleasant, and we try to be reasonable,” said Buzan.

“We understand we’re dealing with people’s property and that’s important to them,” he added. “You get out in the open forest and people get a new neighbor next door who doesn’t like their stuff. That stuff has been there for 20 years, and now the new neighbor doesn’t like it It’s almost like a game of pinball; you’re bouncing all around trying to get everybody to get along and enjoy each other.

“I’m really proud of my two officers. They cover a lot of ground, they cover a lot of cases and they deal with a lot of people. They’re very professional; they keep their cool and work through it.”