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Council Meeting: October 12, 1982 Santa Monica, California ~/
T0: Mayor and City Council .OCT 121982
FROPi: City Staff
SUBJECT; Request to Conduct Weed and Litter Abatement
Program Throughout the Year
Introduction
This report requests the City Council to approve increased Weed
and Litter Abatement activity in the Street Sweeping Division.
Revenues to offset the expenditures from this increased activity
will be generated by property owner assessments from Weed and
Litter Citations.
Background
Once a year, the General Services Department staff conducts an
inspection of all vacant lots as well as developed property and
issues citations to property owners to abate weeds and/or litter.
If property owners do not comply, the City conducts the work
(using a private contractor) and through assessment procedures
bills the property owners for the cost of the work. Funds for
this project are budgeted annually in the Street Division budget.
Any other litter and weed nuisance conditions are handled on a
complaint basis throughout the year.
Recently, General Services' Inspectors have increased the number
of citations issued for litter and weed conditions due to a public
desire for a cleaner city and a decision to make the Weed and
Litter Program a more comprehensive year-round program.. The
elimination of the CETA Alley Cleaning Program has also led to
more litter problems in alleys.
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Council Meeting: October 12, 1982 Santa Monica, California
As a result of this increase in inspection and citation activity,
there are a large number of locations that have been cited for
weed or litter abatement but have not been cleaned. The citations
issued by the City state that if the property owner does not abate
the condition within 10 days, the City will do the work and assess
the cost to the property owner. However, there are not sufficient
City personnel available to perform this work due to the normal
heavy maintenance workload.
It is for these reasons staff is requesting additional part-time
employees to conduct this clean up work. Revenues from the
assessments will offset this cost as follows:
Current Backlog of Weed/Litter
Citations
125 @ $100 (average cost) $12,500
Projected 25 Citations per Month
September 1982 through June 1983
25 X 10 months X $100 25,000
Potential Assessment Revenues
through June 1983 $37,500
In the past, experience has shown that about 10% of the recipients
of weed/litter abatement citations actually conduct the work
themselves. Therefore, approximately 90% of the assessment
revenues as shown above will accrue to the City's Refuse revenue
accounts when the potential work is done and billing completed.
As with all assessments, there will be lag time before the
assessments are paid and credited to the revenue fund.
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Council Meeting: October 12, 1982 Santa Monica, California
Recommendation
It is recommended that the City Council approve increased Weed and
Litter Abatement activity in the Street Sweeping Division as
stated above.
Prepared by: Stan Scholl
Neil Miller
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