Monroe City Council discusses drafting vacant-property registration ordinance

City staff on Monday described options for a vacant-property registration ordinance and asked the City Council whether to direct staff to prepare a draft for future consideration.

Assistant City Manager and Economic Development Director Mark Cochran told the council the ordinance would be a tool “to know what properties are vacant and what’s their use so that we have an actual registration from the owners of those properties,” and that the presentation was intended to “get feedback on whether this is something we should take that extra step … toward drafting and bringing back” a proposed ordinance.

Council members said they were sympathetic to the goal of reducing blight and easing the city’s administrative burden in tracking absentee owners, but raised questions about timelines, exemptions and enforcement that Cochran said staff would address in a draft. Several council members urged a longer registration window than the shortest examples Cochran reviewed, and asked staff to consider exemptions for short vacancies such as imminent sales, snowbirds and probate cases.

Cochran outlined common elements from other Michigan ordinances: a registration form submitted within a set number of days after a property becomes vacant (examples ranged from…