{"id":6957,"date":"2014-08-12T11:07:12","date_gmt":"2014-08-12T15:07:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chescotimes.com\/?p=6957"},"modified":"2014-08-12T11:07:12","modified_gmt":"2014-08-12T15:07:12","slug":"coatesville-adopts-inspection-fee-rental-license-ordinance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/?p=6957","title":{"rendered":"Coatesville adopts inspection fee, rental license ordinance"},"content":{"rendered":"

Also: DA Hogan praises City Council for chief, police hires
\n<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

By Kyle Carrozza<\/strong>,\u00a0Staff Writer, The Times<\/span><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

\"HoganCoatesville\"<\/a>

District Attorney Tom Hogan thanks city council for their support of the police department.<\/p><\/div>\n

COATESVILLE \u2013 Amid vocal opposition from landlords of the Coatesville Housing Association, City Council passed an ordinance on Monday night that will charge landlords $50 for inspections, $25 per unit for rental licenses, and a $50 to clear complaints should tenants find their units in violation of city code.<\/p>\n

While some landlords were fine with the inspection and license fees, they opposed the $50 fee to clear complaints, saying that tenants could use unfounded complaints to punish landlords for unrelated disagreements.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe tenant can call every day. There\u2019s no language in there that says the tenant needs to call the landlord first and explain the problem. If the landlord and tenant have a disagreement, all the tenant has to do is call up, and every time they call it\u2019s $50,\u201d said landlord Joseph Leofsky.<\/p>\n

Council President Joseph Hamrick said that while that may be the case, inspections to ensure complaints are taken care of still cost the city money.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t know what issues you have with your tenant,\u201d he said. \u201cWhen our department is called in on that, we have to charge a fee. If it\u2019s a bogus call, we still have to inspect.\u201d<\/p>\n

Council Vice President David Collins agreed.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have to cover the operating costs for doing business,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

City Codes Director Damalier Molina said that he has not seen many unfounded calls for inspection.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf landlords are on top of their properties, you won\u2019t have a lot of these issues,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Council Member Ed Simpson opposed the ordinance, saying it needed to be vetted further.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we need to discuss some of the issues that the landlords have brought up,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Simpson also said that the city could possibly raise taxes rather than charging for each inspection on an individual basis. He said that the city is a service provider, and they do not charge citizens for each individual police response, for example.<\/p>\n

Council Member Marie Hess said that part of the reason she voted in favor of the ordinance was because the city has not collected anything for the fees in question this year. She said that in order for the city to start collecting those fees, which were projected in the budget, the motion had to be passed.<\/p>\n

District Attorney Tom Hogan also gave a presentation Monday night thanking City Council for their hiring of additional police officers and Police Chief Jack Laufer.<\/p>\n

After 2012, which Hogan called one of the worst years in Coatesville, the DA\u2019s office implored council to hire a strong police chief and additional officers. Hogan said that Coatesville has since gone a year and a half without a murder.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou gave us Jack Laufer, a chief who is strong, a man of great personal integrity, a man of outstanding experience, and a man of very good judgment,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Hogan said that council also put \u201cgood, aggressive\u201d officers out there. He closed his presentation with a request.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you talk to the members of the school board and tell them when I suggest something it\u2019s not necessarily a bad idea, that would be appreciated,\u201d he joked.<\/p>\n

Laufer responded by thanking Hogan\u2019s office for doing their part in reducing crime, calling cooperation between the police department and DA\u2019s office a partnership. He also said that Hogan helped to mentor him when he first took over as police chief in Coatesville.<\/p>\n

In order to help those crime fighting efforts, council also voted in favor of the appointment of part time officers Ryan Corcorran and Jared Davis to full time status.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Also: DA Hogan praises City Council for chief, police hires By Kyle Carrozza,\u00a0Staff Writer, The Times COATESVILLE \u2013 Amid vocal opposition from landlords of the Coatesville Housing Association, City Council passed an ordinance on Monday night that will charge landlords $50 for inspections, $25 per unit for rental licenses, and a $50 to clear complaints […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6958,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,7],"tags":[1016,181,185,238,488],"class_list":["post-6957","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-featured","tag-chief-jack-laufer","tag-city-council","tag-coatesville","tag-district-attorney-tom-hogan","tag-police"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6957","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6957"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6957\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6958"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6957"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6957"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6957"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}