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Residents press council on ICE policy and local code-enforcement complaints; officials say they will follow up
Summary
During public comment, residents urged Kettering to defend privacy rights against ICE administrative-warrant entries and raised detailed complaints about code-enforcement practices and storm-water damage; council acknowledged the concerns and said staff would follow up.
Three residents used the public-comment period at the Jan. 27 meeting to press Kettering City Council on separate but serious concerns: a call for local action on ICE entry practices, allegations of targeted and improper code-enforcement actions, and longstanding storm-water damage at a commercial property.
"Citizens and residents of Kettering have a constitutional right to the privacy of their homes," said Austin Vega, who called on the mayor and council to "do everything in their power to uphold this right" in response to federal memos authorizing entry with administrative warrants.
Aaron Hamblin described an extended dispute with a private property-maintenance inspector and multiple city contacts. He alleged the inspector issued repeated notices and fines, that a city office interaction escalated into a forcible removal from the law office lobby, and asked for an independent investigation into the inspector’s conduct and potential coordination with police. "I would like an outside independent investigator to look into it because I'm not too trust I don't trust the police department to do it," Hamblin said.
Doug Conan, a local business owner, said repeated storm-water intrusion to his building on Wilmington Pike has caused business losses and more than $25,000 in damages over several years and that his requests for code-enforcement assistance have gone unanswered. He urged the council to support small-business retention in upcoming planning work.
Council members thanked speakers for bringing the matters forward. Mayor Sudith and staff said they would follow up on the complaints; staff offered to review the law-office incident and code-enforcement records and to provide further information to council and the complainant. No formal action or vote was taken on the complaints during the meeting.
Because the comments included allegations against named local actors and descriptions of potential misconduct, the council’s promise to follow up was the only formal response recorded during the meeting.
