County May Add Some Teeth To Zoning Code Enforcement

The county zoning code inspector might be getting a badge sometime soon as county commissioners try to squelch chronic zoning violators.

County commissioners on Tuesday decided to study three options to improve code enforcement: Having the sheriff’s office handle tough cases as part of its regular caseload, paying the sheriff’s office to handle the cases as a higher priority or giving inspector Allan deLaubenfels police power.

“If we don’t take care of it, it just breeds contempt and cynicism from the public,” Commissioner Steve Hasson said.

It breeds car farms. It breeds unauthorized backyard BMX tracks. It breeds apartment buildings in neighborhoods zoned for single family homes.

Most people follow the law, and most violators fix problems when coaxed, deLaubenfels said. Of the 300 to 400 complaints investigated every year, 15 to 20 are referred to District Court. Less than five actually end up in court.

And then there are the niggling 22 cases that have lingered in limbo for up to nine years - the back yard filled with abandoned cars, the carwrecking yards, the abandoned railroad rock. These cases have gone to court. Arrest warrants have been issued. Nothing has changed.

Some problems have been around so long that neighbors have stopped complaining.

DeLaubenfels worries that he may be seen as a paper tiger, as someone with no teeth behind his words. He hopes that will change.

“We found a leak in the ship, and commissioners are trying to plug that hole,” deLaubenfels said.

The sheriff’s department admits that misdemeanor warrants such as those for zoning violations are not aggressively pursued. At least 25,000 warrants are outstanding in Spokane County, and felony warrants take priority over misdemeanor warrants.

Several years ago, a four-person warrant unit was assigned to track and arrest people named on warrants. But the unit’s been eliminated.

Lt. Ken Marshall said the county would probably find paying to enforce misdemeanor warrants fairly expensive. He also doubts that the code warrants will rise in priority.

Marshall said the sheriff’s office commissions three levels of special deputies. DeLaubenfels could probably be commissioned at the lowest level with little trouble.

“This sounds like a problem that can be solved real simply with people just talking to each other,” Marshall said.

County commissioners seemed to be leaning Tuesday toward giving deLaubenfels special police powers. Hasson balked at paying deputies to enforce warrants and complained that practice would lead to a la carte law enforcement.

Commissioner Phil Harris said deLaubenfels should have enforcement power.

Some at the meeting worried about potentially hostile warrant recipients. DeLaubenfels said it’s not his place to comment on any decision by the commission.

But, he added, “I’d rather see the sheriff do what the sheriff’s supposed to do, and I do what I’m supposed to do.”

, DataTimes