CARE system

[Doug V]

The CARE system is a topic I have had enough experience with that I think I can bring some much needed clarity to the discussion.

Does SPAR conduct mass CARE complaint campaigns against targeted properties?  Not to my knowledge, and I ought to know.  As an active part of SPAR's Block Captains for years I led an effort to use the CARE system on a much larger scale.  We often discussed the CARE system in Block Captins meetings, and I suspect I have placed more complaints than anyone in Jax.  I still use it, and encourage my neighbors to do the same.

The majority of issues I place in CARE call for the city to take action, not the property owner.  Examples: requests to pick up missed garbage and tires, repair sidewalks, remove dead trees, abandoned cars, etc.

We certainly do use it to try to get delinquent property owners to clean to their act.  It can be effective, but it can also fail, for example if the property owner can't be located, or if he ignores to threat of escalating fines.  I never had the ability or inclination to get groups of neighbors to file a complaint on the same property, let alone hundreds.  Even if I could, I don't think that multiple complaints bring much more attention that a single one.  Each must be evaluated by the city, and judged on its merits wrt city code.

As to speaking with neighbors, block captains do that too.  I devised a postcard that we have sent to many residents and owners.  Our objective with these is primarily educational, i.e. politely reminding residents to put garbage in containers, and call in waste tires.

Is it possible to indicate who is placing the CARE issue?  Yes, it certainly is.  Block Captains had no policy as to submitting anonymously or not, but I always include my name, and I think most of us do.

Does CARE work?  Not perfectly, but pretty well.  I am confident that Block Captains' efforts have led to hundreds or tires being removed, tons of garbage removed, dozens (hundreds?) of overgrown lots mown, lots of sidewalks repaired, hundreds of streetlights repaired (strictly speaking, not via CARE) and many abandoned cars removed.

CARE complaint can and have helped get major heat brought to bear on delinquent property owners and slumlords.  They can, via due process, ultimately lead to big fines.  See for example: http://www.duvalclerk.com/oncoreweb/showdetails.aspx?id=8568291&rn=84&pi=5&ref=search .

So I can imagine that irresponsible property owners and slumlords don't care for CARE, and wish SPAR and Springfielders wouldn't use it, but used skillfully, it can do very good things for the neighborhood.  Residents ought to love it.  (And I think they generally do.)

[sheclown]

http://www.metrojacksonville.com/forum/index.php/topic,6536.0.html

How do you reconcile this with the RED ALERT call to action from SPAR? 

[Springfielder]

As a block captain, I've filed a great many complaints and still do. As a whole, it does work and I've had very positive outcomes...but yes, there's the property owners that don't care about fines and allow the property to fall into despair. Having too many complaints, I've also noticed seem to escalate to where the city will or considers knocking the property down...so it's a double edge sword.

[Springfielder]

Any actual properties I've reported, there's no owner in the area to talk with.

[fsu813]

B/C asking someione to cleanup thier act, even in a nice way, is often not appreciated by the offender.

"It's none of your business" or something like that, kind or harsh, is the repsonse more often than you muight think.

This can lead to a rift, a perceived confrontation, a perceived wrong, or feeling victimized....even though they are not.

The CARE system is meant to cut all that out.

I just placed 2 CARE requests in yesterday, one for the caved in portion of sidewalk on Walnut and another for huge piles of branches that the city neglected to pick up after they cut them down several weeks ago.

Very effective system for thse types of things.

[chris farley]

Matt did you not have a big problem with a house (housing several people ) on your block.  Wasn't the owner in Seattle, did you talk to the owner?  Didn't you go to SPAR for help and they took care of it for you (and was accused of harrassment by this owner) and the place was emptied?  I only know of this because I was there when your wife thanked Louise.  It is so easy to suppport iffy stuff if it is not on your block?

Incidently I have never called the care system or reported anyone and for the first 5 years I was here there was a group home 4 doors down from me.

Strider and Sheclown, HSCC wrote the book on checking and reporting on neighbors, the monthly walks are in the records.

[Doug V]

As to the "Red Alert", this was not a Block Captain thing.  I'm not aware that the Block Captains were asked in any non-routine way to make targeted CARE complaints.  That being said, what the memo suggests, i.e. making complaints to code enforcement, is generally consistent with what Block Captains have done, with generally successful results I would contend.

As to talking with the property owners, I agree that that is a good thing to do (hence the cards, and also phone calls).  I think many folks are reluctant to do this, anticipating potentially antagonistic responses.  Actually my experience was that I more often was met with indifference than antagonism.  I guess I ask myself on a case by case basis, it this a situation where a friendly card or call would do, or one where the owner surely knows better, and the slightly more threatening letter from the city would be more appropriate?

Ultimately, the factor that very often makes it difficult to have this dialog with owners is that they live outside the neighborhood, and can't be located or refuse to respond.

Doug Vanderlaan
Market & 5th

[chris farley]

Matt what do you think people should be doing to solve such problems if you cannot look out for strange activity without being accused of all kinds of trangressions? 

[chris farley]

I agree with you - nice to talk to you

[soxfan]

The CARE system is meant to cut all that out.

I just placed 2 CARE requests in yesterday, one for the caved in portion of sidewalk on Walnut

Hey FSU813 Thanks, I've been meaning to get around to putting that in. That's my house. One of the wandering locals walked by on Sunday and tried to tell my wife that he could trip and fall and sue me for that. My wife told him that it's city property not ours and he'd have to take it up with the city. Apparently, he did. My wife got a call from a lady with the city today. The guy filed a suit against the city saying he fell in that crack. The lady is coming to my house this afternoon to get a statement from my wife.. I wish I'd had put that CARE request in sooner now, save the city from this hassle.. Again, Thanks for putting it in..

[ChriswUfGator]

Does SPAR conduct mass CARE complaint campaigns against targeted properties?

Absolutely.

[Doug V]

CARE complaints can and have helped get major heat brought to bear on delinquent property owners and slumlords.  They can, via due process, ultimately lead to big fines.  See for example: http://www.duvalclerk.com/oncoreweb/showdetails.aspx?id=8568291&rn=84&pi=5&ref=search .

[Springfielder]

True, they do...however the city makes no effort to collect or even take the property for Sheriff sale as most major cities do. A property with many complaints can then land on the demo list...which has happened many times.

[strider]

That is the trouble with using the CARE system that way.  Many fought long and hard to save the very houses many who call in those complaints are living in.  Without a check system, which  exists but has been overridden by the city, HPC and SPAR Council upon occasion, the houses are destined to come down.  While it seems fine to try to force some absentee owner to address an old condemned and forgotten house, often the issue is one of not being able to secure financing or simply, as some houses have been done, taking years to pay cash to do it yourself as much as possible.  Lately these houses have been put at risk by an economy that makes it more difficult to finance the rehabs, a city who find it easier to tear them down and an organization with a leader that thinks tearing them down is fine as well.

The CARE system is indeed for those complaints about pot holes, over grown weeds, trash sitting on the side of the road and even illegal activity (use) to some extent but when it gets used to put houses on the fast track to demolition to force people to do something, it becomes wrong.  When it is used to try to put someone out of their homes because you don’t like them, it becomes wrong.  The CARE system is a great tool, but like any tool, it needs to be used properly.

[ChriswUfGator]

CARE complaints can and have helped get major heat brought to bear on delinquent property owners and slumlords.  They can, via due process, ultimately lead to big fines.  See for example: http://www.duvalclerk.com/oncoreweb/showdetails.aspx?id=8568291&rn=84&pi=5&ref=search .

Oh I'm a slumlord now, great! Thanks Doug!

As a quick side note, this is starting to sound an awful lot like libel. I can find out who you are too...

You're conveniently posting only the half of the story that supports your viewpoint. I guess you didn't feel it important to mention that I sued COJ, or that the GC's office agreed that the fine was illegal and immediately settled with my attorneys, or that it was vacated it in its entirety without me having to pay a cent of that ridiculous $120k judgment.

Seems like if you post one you should post the other, no?

http://www.duvalclerk.com/oncoreweb/showdetails.aspx?id=9703736&rn=0&pi=0&ref=search

The alleged violations were nonexistent to begin with, and then COJ sent the only notice of the MCEB hearing to a former rental property on Dignan Street, where I didn't live and hadn't even owned for 5 years. Needless to say, I never got the notice, or I would have been present at the original hearing, and the fines would never have been issued in the first place. You seem to have left that part out too.

And the whole thing was strangely coincidental, since they never had any problem finding my *actual* house, you know...where I *actually* live...either before or after that incident. I suspect it was an attempted railroad-job by a code officer with "friends in the neighborhood." I only found out about it later, and I immediately filed suit the minute I heard about it. But again, you seem to have left that part out.

Meanwhile:

Doug Vanderlaan
Chair, Sector B SHADCO
vanderla@comcast.net
(904) 923-5179

I will withhold posting your address at this time, because I believe that might violate this site's TOS. But I have it.

What you've done by posting a copy of an administrative fine and calling me a "slumlord", without mentioning the fact that COJ was sued, and that the fine was determined to be illegal and completely vacated, constitutes libel per se.

And SHADCO eh?

But let's be clear: If you do it to me again, I'm going to handle this in a different fashion.