Ron O’Connor with the Community Development Department says he will ask the Sacramento City Council to approve $470,000 in liens. The debts are owed by property owners who combined have more than 400 city fines or fees.
“We have title reports, we have clouds that we put on the title that tells anybody that’s looking to buy it that we have action going against it, board-ups that we do on these houses –we have to hire a contractor to go out and board them up," O'Connor says. "Basically on a lot of them, we turn into the management company for abandoned houses that nobody’s taking care of.”
O’Conner estimates about three-quarters of the homes were abandoned by the owners.
"The bank waits until the last second to take them over so they don’t have their name on it," he says. "Transients tend to move in –the first group that comes in steals all the copper, aluminum, all the wire- and the next groups that come in just camp out in there.”
In separate items on the city council's agenda, the Community Development Department will also ask for 43-thousand dollars in liens for weed and blight abatement for occupied buildings. The Revenue Department will ask for another 50-thousand dollars for managing untended vacant lots.
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