Housing Committee Hears About The Unwanted Phone Book Scurge And Much More, A Detailed Rundown Of The Nov. 5, 2008 Meeting

Photo By John Hoff

The Housing Committee met, as usual, the first Wednesday of the month. These are not official minutes, however...

The Secretary was absent due to unfortunate sickness, and since I was the only committee member with a laptop, I was pressed into duty taking notes. Happy to be of service.

Here are some of highlights of the meeting:

* Third Way Network shut down? Third Way Network, which has been around for five years and approached the Hawthorne neighborhood with some ideas described as "marvelous sounding," has reportedly been shut down by its board. Jeff Skrenes will follow up to try to find out more information about the situation and the reported shut down. (As of today, the Third Way Network website is still up, and still soliciting donations)

* According to Jeff Skrenes, Kevin Gulden of PPL wanted to pass on some "good news." Demolition funding passed on 3023 4th St. N. will not be needed because the house has received a MURL designation, so other funding will go to that effort. HOWEVER, it is hoped PPL will rehab "3023" rather than demolish it.

In any case, now that the property has a MURL designation, "we don't need to use our money."

* There was a long discussion about problem properties and whether the neighborhood's representative at city council was being responsive and communicative with the Hawthorne neighborhood or, for that matter, other neighborhoods in Ward 3.

In regard to 2207 6th St. N., which was the subject of a recent police raid, Kevin happily reported that currently the property is "quiet as a mouse."Kevin pointed out that the change State Rep. Linda Higgins made to the nuisance law allowed quick action on 2207. Had Higgins not sponsored the change it might have taken two more raids to get inspections involved.

* There was a long discussion about phone books. Ed Kohler's helpful "worksheet" about unwanted phone book dumping, available and downloadable on his blog, click here, was provided as part of the discussion. Laban Ohito made the suggestion the best approach was the first approach the phone book companies rather than the city government. It was agreed Jeff Skrenes would write to the phone book companies about the negative impact their unwanted phone books were having, particularly at vacant properties.

(Here is a website which supposedly allows you to "opt out" of the Yellow Pages, click here for www.yellowpagesgoesgreen.com. )

Somehow, I have my doubts it really works, but maybe it is good to make the record for A FUTURE CLASS ACTION LAWSUIT AGAINST UNWANTED PHONE BOOK DUMPING!!!!! ARG!!!!!)

* The committee heard about the money available for rehabbing houses, and ultimately voted to move around $100,000 to the owner occupied revolving loan fund to support new loan applications.

* There was a discussion about what the criteria should be to inspect rental properties. This was sparked by a letter from the Regulatory Services Department to the Hawthorne Neighborhood (and presumably to many other neighborhoods, as well) which I'm including, verbatim, as follows:

To Whom It May Concern,

The Housing Inspection Services division of Regulatory Services is considering a change in our process and policy for the frequency of inspections for residential rental properties in Minneapolis. Excessive housing inspection calls for service at rental properties which are not regularly maintained to minimum code standards create safety and livability issues for residents and neighbors. It is our intent to develop and implement a plan for rental license inspection schedules based on the conditions and maintenance of rental properties.

Although we touch approximately 50% of all rental properties each year responding to nuisance conditions and complaints, we currently conduct our proactive rental license inspections on a 5 to 6 year schedule. We are asking your help to develop criteria for categorizing rental properties for the purpose of determining the frequency of proactive rental license inspections.

The residential rental properties which are not properly maintained would be inspected more frequently than those properties which consistently meet licensing standards.

Some of the criteria we are considering include the following:

* Number of violations at the property in a given period of time.

* Properties where confirmed lead poisoning of a child has occurred.

* Properties in which the owner has not complied with violation correction notices by the due date given.

Housing Inspection Services needs your help to develop the criteria that will be used to determine the frequency of proactive rental license inspections of a rental property. Your input is important. We had originally planned to ask key members of each neighborhood group to attend one of a series of meetings to discuss the criteria. However, one neighborhood association staffer wisely informed us that you do not need another meeting in your busy lives...

(Yeah, and Johnny Northside Dot Com just awarded that staffer, whoever he/she was, a Good Conduct Medal)

...So, instead, we ask that your neighborhood association or group complete the enclosed forms and return by November 26, 2008.

On the enclosed form we are asking you to let us know what criteria should be considered to determine the frequency of rental license inspections. You can select from the example above or you may have different criteria you would like to list. Please rate each listed criteria from 1 to 10 in the order of importance, 1 being the most important and 10 being the least important. Please do not rate all criteria as most important.

(...)

Setting the criteria for frequency of rental license inspections will be critical to the success of conducting meaningful, proactive rental license inspections that put our resources where they are most needed. We are counting on you, with your knowledge of the challenges you face with residential properties in your neighborhood, to help us identify ways to make the inspections program successful.

Sincerely,

Janine Atchinson, District Manager, Housing Inspection Services.

The "sample criteria" included were interesting to me. Here they are:

EXAMPLE 1: Illegal behavior at the property. (1)
EXAMPLE 2: Repeated incidents of tall grass & weeds (3)

* Lastly, at the Housing Committee meeting, the "MinneAppleseed" group which wants to build a passive energy house in Hawthorne presented a chart of various sites ranked according to suitability. Their number one choice was 3119 4th St. N.

More on THAT property momentarily.

It was a good meeting. Stuff got done.