Approving a tighter-than-usual budget earlier this year, councilors in Springfield, Massachusetts are looking to bring cash to city coffers however they can. One route under consideration: naming and shaming ordinance violators into paying unpaid tickets.
For the past few years, city officials say tickets have been adding up for a parcel off of Allen Street and Island Pond Road – a fenced off area beside the Dollar Tree that's become a dumping ground, says Ward 6 City Councilor Victor Davila.
“You got tires, you got mattresses, you got water jugs, milk jugs, diapers- you name it. This is a health issue,” he said during a General Government Sub-Committee meeting Thursday carried by Focus Springfield.
Chair of subcommittee, Davila handed out photos of the spot loaded with trash bags, carboard boxes and spray paint cans
Code enforcers say the spot’s now the subject of almost weekly inspections – with Dollar Tree racking up $200 tickets, on top of tickets from years past, totaling just over $3,000.
Almost half of that’s been paid already, but as Davila and others have observed, a lot of cash is outstanding - not just there, but across the city of over 150,000.
The councilor says, conservatively, there’s likely to be at least a million dollars being left on the table. It’s prompted officials like Councilor At Large Brian Santaniello to ask – is there any way to name and shame chronic violators?
“Is there any way that we could put these major violators up on our website, which is a public website, so that people can see these violations and maybe the pictures of the disgusting garbage on the property and stuff, so maybe they'll come in and say ‘, I don't want to lose my business here, and people are looking at that - I'm going to go pay that fine,’” he said during a June 17 meeting.
It’s an idea supported by Davila and others in the face of tighter spending the city’s coping with.
This year’s $985.7 million budget featured the elimination of vacant roles and skipping many department requests for additional funding – avoiding the use of stabilization funds to stay balanced.
Given the potential money in terms of unpaid violation tickets, Davila tells WAMC there's a chance to kill two birds with one stone – shame serial code violators and collect much-needed funds more quickly, which he says could total as much as $3 million.
“We’re just trying to get a handle as to what the process for the city is. I do believe that there is enough concern throughout the city and enough incidents throughout the city to really tackle this issue head on,” he said. “We are not exactly sure where the authority lies and what kind of tools and toolbox we have to tackle this [with] … but we are definitely committed to continue doing this, because … we are not going to be hijacked by bad actors.”
Speaking at the June meeting, City Solicitor Stephen Buoniconti says he's seen the name and shame system work in the past on individuals in different kinds of arrears.
Following up on the idea Thursday was Associate City Solicitor Thomas Moore. Tasked with searching for similar cases and systems, Moore said Boston has published outstanding code violations in the past, albeit lists that don’t list an individual’s name, giving a property’s location instead.
While Springfield itself has occasional public awareness campaigns for code violations, often showing extreme cases of illegal dumping, one has to look out-of-state for the sort of system described by councilors.
“From what we’re describing, the closest thing I could find was something that was done in the south, done in Mississippi, where they passed a special act that allowed them to take a list of people who have not paid municipal fines or fees like littering, and then publish them on the city’s website or in the newspaper, as well,” Moore said. “They had some requirements that went with that, as you might expect. There has to sort of be a due process element to it, where you have to have a chance to go through the adjudication, but if it's a finalized thing, there was no appeal taken, the ticket is outstanding – my understanding of the law they passed was that they could do what we’re looking to do.
Ironically, one solution might be to simply do nothing for now.
As it turns out, one factor behind unpaid tickets languishing is the software they’re logged in. City officials believe different systems used across city departments don’t easily share info with one another – something that should be mended as the city implements new OpenGov software.
Over the next three months of its rollout, Davila says he and others will be keeping tabs on the rollout to see what they can yield. Proponents of the software say it should allow the city to more easily attach unpaid tickets to tax bills.
WAMC attempted to contact Dollar Tree using a number listed for the business. According to city officials, recent conversations with a store representative indicated they're working to address the matter, though the recent departure of a district manager may be complicating matters.
