Syracuse committee weighs adding unpaid BAA fines to property tax bills

City of Syracuse officials and councilors discussed a proposal to amend local law so unpaid fines and penalties assessed by the city's Bureau of Administrative Adjudication (BAA) could be placed on property tax bills.

Leah, director and chief administrative law judge for the Bureau of Administrative Adjudication, said the BAA was created locally in 2018 to provide a faster administrative path to address noncompliant property code violations and that "The BAA's authority is just for, issuing civil fines and penalties, and nothing more than that." She told the committee the bureau has struggled to collect those fines under current mechanisms.

The proposal would add a tax-rollover collection mechanism similar to other city charges that are put on tax bills. City staff described the change as a tool to encourage compliance with housing and property maintenance codes and to recover unpaid penalties that otherwise remain unpaid until a property sale triggers a tax search.

Why it matters: Councilors and staff said the change is intended to help the city collect penalties that now frequently go unpaid, and to provide leverage against chronic noncompliant owners. One councilor said "we have a million dollars sitting on the table that we could potentially recoup," referencing staff calculations of fines and defaults.

How the BAA process works: Code enforcement issues a notice of violation with a comply-by date; if the owner does not comply, the inspector can issue a legal warning letter and ultimately refer the case to the BAA. BAA tickets carry individual fines for each violation and are served…