City Council debates code-enforcement policy without reaching consensus

The end result it appears, at least for now, businesses can go on ignoring the building codes, unless somebody complains.

The Lemoore City Council, at its Tuesday meeting, took on a letter written by Planning Commission Chairman Jeff Garcia, and approved by all but one of the commissioners, that the council take a second look at its “business-friendly” policy that commissioners say is creating confusion and blighted conditions within the city.

According to the letter, “it is a well-known fact that the city council in its effort to be more business friendly, has advised staff in both the planning department and Lemoore Police Department to only investigate and cite violations that have received complaints” rather that actively enforce violations throughout the city.

The only commissioner opposed to sending the letter was Bill Wynne who suggested that the city staff could be overworked and that staff should respond to complaints only. He also criticized Garcia, who he says has been in violation of the code for over two years.

As it stands now, code enforcement is virtually non-existent, unless someone complains about it, and then a code enforcement officer visits the non-compliant business. “Some businesses will correct it in a timely way, some don’t.” said Judy Holwell, a city planning staffer.

The Lemoore Police Department often seeks code enforcement compliance. Chief Darrell Smith admitted that he was told last year that the police were not to seek out non-compliance. “The message was sent to address these issues on a complaint basis,” he said. He added that there was a message sent out, but not written.

Garcia, who initiated the letter, owns a business at 450 D Street and has a sign on his building in violation of the code, yet he was not asked to remove it or has he been cited for it, prompting Councilmember Billy Siegel to refer to Garcia as a hypocrite. “Garcia is sending a message by leaving up his sign. Not complying with codes. Why would the rest of the business community not comply when a planning commissioner doesn’t comply with the codes?”

Garcia was quick to respond at the previous Planning Commission meeting that he intentionally left the sign in order to highlight the ineffectiveness of the code-enforcement process. “I did highlight my building intentionally just to show that there is a lack of code enforcement,” he said in response to another Planning Commissioner, Bill Wynn. “And certainly a lack of proactive citations which has led, in my opinion, and the opinions of many in the city and some of the commissioners, that has led to a decline in the look and appeal of our business districts.”

In fact, Garcia presented a power point during a February Planning Commission meeting highlighting several code violations throughout the downtown district. He included a photo of his building as well.

Garcia added that he’s sure the council had good intentions when it adopted the “business-friendly” policy and told city staff and police not to enforce it. He said that it is clear now that the policy is not “business friendly” but rather “un-business friendly.”

Councilmember Ray Madrigal took exception to a policy he says is vague. “Was there really direction from this body?” he asked. “Were we supposed to look the other way?” He said that perhaps not enforcing the code is an inappropriate response. “What’s the object of the code? Are we trying to be business friendly? I think so, especially to keep our city attractive, now more than every because we’re spending money to attract businesses to come here. Is Lemoore going to be an appealing place, or willy, nilly, people can do what they want? What exactly are we trying to do?”

Garcia echoed Madrigal’s thoughts. “We’ve identified problems that have become issues in the business district,” he said. “These are very telling. These aren’t issues you have to look for, these are very blatant violations of our city’s codes.”

He added that he’s simply asking council to enforce the codes equitably. “They need to be enforced equally, across the board, for everyone.”