(a) The Council of the City of Ripley now desires to specifically and formally adopt an ordinance that was proposed in Ripley’s Home Rule Plan where a shortened time period under West Virginia Code Section 8-12-16a for forfeiture of structures when owners refuse to address code violations at uninhabitable properties to a period of twelve months. The City of Ripley Home Rule Plan was approved by the State of West Virginia’s Home Rule Board on August 14, 2019.
(b) The City of Ripley wishes to adequately address several nuisance properties within its corporate limits that have become dilapidated, unkempt or in state of prolonged and consistent disrepair.
(c) These blighted properties unfairly decrease the market value of neighboring properties as well as provide for an unsafe and unhealthy environment for the community.
(d) West Virginia Code 8-12-16 mandates that procedural and proper notification requirements be in accordance with the law concerning service of process of civil actions and on the premises affected by the complaint or order.
(e) Specifically, West Virginia Code 8-12-16(a), (n) if a registration fee remains delinquent for two years from the date it was placed on record in the clerk of the county commission in which the property is located and assessed, the municipality may take action to receive the subject property by means of forfeiture. Should the municipality take the steps necessary to receive the subject property, the municipality then becomes the owner of record and takes the property, the municipality then becomes the owner of record and takes the property subject to all liens and real and personal and property taxes.
(f) The City of Ripley believes abandoned and unkept properties cause decay in the City’s neighborhoods and a decline in the value of neighboring properties while creating unsafe and unhealthy living conditions.
(g) The fiscal impact of unkept or blighted properties has an adverse effect on the municipality, the individual property owners and community/neighborhood development. The City of Ripley has to deal with health and safety issues related to the property and the individual proeprty owners and neighborhood must also contend with the same issues and the ramifications of the devaluation of their own property investments.
(h) The City of Ripley Council hereby creates Section 1717.10. If a registration fee remains delinquent for twelve months from the date it was placed on record in the Office of the Clerk of the Jackson County Commission, West Virginia, the City of Ripley may take action to receive the subject property by means of forfeiture. Should the City of Ripley take the steps necessary to receive the subject property, the City of Ripley becomes the owner of record and takes the property subject to all liens and real and personal property taxes.
(9-17-20)