Council recognizes and declares that abandoned motor vehicles, junked motor vehicles, old vehicle tires and certain abandoned or inoperative household appliances are and constitute a public nuisance and hazard to both adults and children and therefore are dangerous and constitute a clear and present danger; that such abandoned motor vehicles, junked motor vehicles, old vehicle tires and certain abandoned or inoperative household appliances serve as harborage and breeding places for rodents, mosquitoes, fleas, ticks, mice, rats and other insects, pests and flies injurious to the public health, safety and general welfare; that abandoned motor vehicles and junked motor vehicles serve frequently as temporary or permanent places of human residence unconducive to public health, safety and welfare; that the accumulation and storage of any of such items or parts thereof on private or public property, including but not limited to highways, is hereby found to create a condition tending to reduce the value of private property and to promote blight and deterioration which if permitted to remain will continue to destroy the natural beauty of this City and have adverse economic and social effects; that such abandoned motor vehicles, junked motor vehicles, old vehicle tires and certain abandoned or inoperative household appliances constitute an attractive nuisance creating a hazard to the health and safety of minors; that such items are nearly always located on public highways, rights of way, or within sight of such highway rights of way and on private property within a reasonable proximity thereto; that all such visual pollution is a deterrent to economic development; and that it is in the public interest and welfare to provide for a program to eliminate the unsightly practice of abandoning motor vehicles, old vehicle tires and certain abandoned or inoperative household appliances.
In view of these findings, Council declares it to be the public policy of the City to eliminate the present danger resulting from abandoned motor vehicles, junked motor vehicles, old vehicle tires and certain abandoned or inoperative household appliances and to eliminate the visual pollution resulting from these items, and that in order to provide for the public health, safety and welfare, and quality of life, to enact legislation to that end by providing expeditious means and methods for effecting the disposal of abandoned motor vehicles, junked motor vehicles, old vehicle tires and certain abandoned household appliances. Council further finds and declares that the presence of an abandoned motor vehicle, junked motor vehicle, old vehicle tires or an abandoned or inoperative household appliance, or any part thereof, on private or public property, including but not limited to highways, except as expressly hereinafter permitted, is a public nuisance injurious to the public health, safety and general welfare of the residents of this City which shall be abated as such by the methods provided in this article.
(1975 Code Sec. 11-11)