A new system is being put in place to track vacant and abandoned housing in Columbus.
Columbus City Council announced Monday they are co-sponsoring an ordinance which will invest $178,000 in a new platform to manage the Vacant, Foreclosure and Wholesaler Registries, according to the Columbus Legistar website.
Council President Pro Tem Rob Dorans said the system is being put in place to help aid code enforcement teams by more quickly identifying vacant properties causing problems in the community.
“By the time a property is being scrutinized by the code enforcement team, that property has likely had weeks, if not months, of issues that have happened, because we've had this very reactive system of having to rely upon residents filing those code complaints with us,” Dorans said.
Dorans said it’s important to track these properties to make sure they aren’t affecting the community in a negative way.
“We know that when vacant or foreclosed on property, you know, is not being occupied, it can very easily become a blight on the neighborhood,” Dorans said. “And you know, these types of registries will allow us to make sure that our code enforcement team is being proactive in making sure that these properties are being upkept and not becoming, you know, a drag on the community that surrounds them.”
The problems these houses suffer from can be extremely minor or very serious, Dorans said.
“It's things as minor as keeping the grass cut, but things as serious as you know, issues with structural problems, or these houses being broken into or other types of issues that sort of create problems for neighbors,” Dorans said.
Dorans said this is just one aspect of a large plan to make affordable housing easier to obtain.
“We know that not one registry or one tenant protection or one affordable housing bond package is going to solve everything, but we know that collectively, these efforts can help make a difference in stabilizing the housing market here in Columbus,” Dorans said.
Though the number of vacant properties has decreased since The Great Recession, Dorans said enforcement teams still estimate there’s around 2,000 and 4,000 vacant properties in the city.
“You know those that range anywhere from between 2,000 and 4,000 sort of, depending on, you know, whether or not a property would meet the definitions of vacant for this legislation,” Dorans said.
Overall, Dorans said hopefully this system will help quickly prioritize properties in neighborhoods that will impact the communities which live by them.
“We know when someone is not living in a housing unit that it is more likely to have issues regarding not being kept up in the manner that the city code would require,” Dorans said. “So, this is a way for us, again, to be far more proactive around these things, rather than waiting until we have countless neighbors saying, ‘Hey this property is becoming a real issue in our neighborhood.'”
