(A) The term NOXIOUS VEGETATION does not include vegetation that constitutes an agricultural crop, unless that vegetation is a health hazard or a fire or traffic hazard within the meaning of division (B) below.
(B) The term NOXIOUS VEGETATION does include, at any time between April 1 and October 31 of any year:
(1) Weeds more than ten inches high;
(2) Grass more than ten inches high and not within the exception stated in division (A) above;
(3) Poison oak;
(4) Poison ivy;
(5) Blackberry bushes that extend into a public thoroughfare or across a property line; and
(6) Vegetation that is:
(a) A health hazard;
(b) A fire hazard because it is near other combustibles; or
(c) A traffic hazard because it impairs the view of a public thoroughfare or otherwise makes use of the thoroughfare hazardous.
(C) Between April 1 and October 31 of any year, no owner or person in charge of property may allow noxious vegetation to be on the property or in the right-of-way of a public thoroughfare abutting on the property. It shall be the duty of an owner or person in charge of property to cut down or to destroy grass, shrubbery, brush, bushes, weeds or other noxious vegetation as often as needed to prevent them from becoming unsightly, from becoming a fire hazard or, in the case of weeds or other noxious vegetation, from maturing or from going to seed.
(D) Between March 15 and April 1 of each year, the City Recorder may cause to be published three times in a newspaper of general circulation in the city a copy of division (C) above as a notice to all owners and persons in charge of property of their duty to keep their property free from noxious vegetation. The notice shall state that the city is willing to abate such nuisance on any particular parcel of property at the request of the owner or person in charge of the property for a fee sufficient to cover the city’s costs of the abatement. The notice shall also state that, even in the absence of such requests, the city intends to abate all such nuisances ten or more days after the final publication of the notice and to charge the cost of doing so on any particular parcel of property to the owner thereof, the person in charge thereof or the property itself.
(E) If the notice provided for in division (D) above is used, it shall be in lieu of the notice required by § 92.21(A) of this chapter.
(Prior Code, § 4.10.090) (Ord. 99, passed 5-18-1981; Ord. 170, passed 2-16-1988; Ord. 273, passed 6-5-2000; Ord. 278, passed 9-18-2000; Ord. 316, passed 4-19-2004; Ord. 340, passed 9-6-2005; Ord. 384, passed 11-2-2009) Penalty, see § 92.99