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City pursues enforcement actions, plans vacant-and-abandoned-structures ordinance
Summary
Mayor updated council on two legal enforcement matters — an order to remove unsafe trailers at Moody Park upheld on appeal, and a historic-district order to remove containers at Lanthier Winery still in litigation — and announced the administration will introduce a vacant-and-abandoned-structures ordinance at the March 18 meeting.
The mayor told the City Council that two long-running enforcement matters remain in the courts and that the administration will introduce a new vacant-and-abandoned-structures ordinance on March 18.
He said a 2023 Board of Public Works and Safety order to remove seven dilapidated trailers from Moody Park has been contested in court by a Mr. Cunningham. The circuit court denied a motion for summary judgment seeking to overturn the board’s order; Cunningham appealed and the Indiana Court of Appeals denied the appeal in January. The mayor said the city continues to defend the order.
Separately, the mayor said the historic-district board’s order to remove containers at Lanthier Winery has been upheld through earlier rulings but the containers remain on site and the city is pursuing a court order to compel compliance; that matter remains active in litigation.
The mayor described both cases as examples of the city’s ongoing blight-elimination and historic-preservation work. He said the administration will introduce a vacant-and-abandoned-structures ordinance at the council’s March 18 meeting to provide additional tools to work with property owners on rehabilitation or abatement plans for unsafe and dilapidated properties.
Council members were told the ordinance will be introduced along with an updated personnel handbook and other policy items. The mayor framed the vacant-and-abandoned-structures ordinance as a tool to work collaboratively with owners to abate blighting conditions but did not provide the ordinance text at this meeting.
