The City of Manchester is going to Concord for help cleaning up the Queen City.
Manchester officials want to change state law so they can have more power to enforce building code violations.
Some local community activists are supporting the effort, but a property owners group says the only thing the changes would bring is more bureaucracy.
NHPR correspondent Brian Early reports.
Will Stewart is on a quest to clean up dilapidated buildings in Manchester.
He's with NeighborWorks of Manchester.
That's a non-profit organization that aims to create affordable homes in safe neighborhoods.
Stewart heads the community services committee made up of area residents.
Members keep an eye on local properties and report code violations to city housing officials.
Stewart is an ardent disciple of what's called the Broken Window theory.
(38 secs) The Broken window theory, it basically states if you don't address and take care of little things, like broken windows, such as trash, like mattress on sidewalks, graffiti and things like that if you don't take of those, it's a sign that the neighborhood doesn't care, and almost an invitation criminal elements can come in and make a marginally bad situation worse. We want to take care of the little things first. That's what this is all about.
Mayor Frank Guinta made fighting crime one of his central campaign promises during the past election.
To that end Guinta has reinstituted the Neighborhood Enhancement Team, known as NET, to respond to mounting complaints about code violations.
NET includes representatives from several city departments including Fire and Police as well as the city's Health Department.
One of its goals is to follow through on complaints and issue citations to homeowners not in compliance.
Since last summer, NET has received more than 120 complaints, many about trash.
And both NET and NeighborWorks proposed that the Board of Alderman and Mayor approve increased fines on non-compliant homeowners.
The Mayor and Alderman followed through.
But the increased fines were not enough, because property owners could pay the fines but still not repair the property.
So NET and NeighborWorks proposed the city put liens on derelict properties.
Matt Normand is Manchester's Deputy Clerk and a member of the Neighborhood Enhancement Team.
(17 secs.) After being found guilty of violations, if the landowner doesn't bring the property into compliance, the city could then potentially take steps to go in and fix the property itself, and then lien the cost of that repair against property value.
However, neither Manchester nor any other city or town in New Hampshire has the authority to put liens on properties for such a purpose.
The State must grant cities and towns the power to do so.
State Representative Tony Simon is a democrat from Manchester.
(28 secs) Generally, New Hampshire City and towns have only that power given to them by the state. So it is very common to need to go to the legislature to get approval for a specific change that would allow a municipality to do something. In other states in the country, municipalities have inherent power to regulate their own affairs. We do not in New Hampshire.
(3 secs) I see a lot of red tape for the city to go through this.
That's Rick Blais, president of New Hampshire's Homeowner Association.
He says although he has no respect for owners who don't take care of their property, he thinks that increasing regulation is not the solution.
(15 secs) What most likely, they'll be a hurry to put a lien on, but the man power won't be there to take the lien off. And someone going to sell the building or transfer the building, there might be some issues down the road with that because the city didn't take it off right away.
Carroll Seigars heads up code enforcement for the town of Laconia.
He says while the power of the lien seems threatening to homeowners, it could actually be beneficial to both parties.
The city could fix up a property, and the owner wouldn't have to pay until it is sold.
(18 secs) There are a lot of people that actually don't have the means to fix up there property for whatever reason, and if a lien was put on the property, eventually, when that property was sold, that lien would be taken care of.
Manchester Alderman and State Senator Betsi DeVries is sponsoring legislation that would give cities and towns the power to put liens on property to fix them up.
The bill is currently being drafted and the details worked out.
So it probably won't make it to the Senate floor before early spring.
For NHPR News in Manchester, I'm Brian Early
