Memorandum

City of Lawrence

Legal Services

TO:	David L. Corliss, Interim City Manager
FROM:	Scott J. Miller, Staff Attorney
Date:	August 30, 2006
RE:	Disorderly House Nuisance Abatement Conferences

I am writing this memo to update you regarding our efforts to enforce the City’s disorderly house nuisance ordinance. As you know, we have been working for some time to attempt to create a workable tracking system for the common offenses that act as triggering events for the disorderly house nuisance procedure. Through the efforts of many people including Vicki Stanwix, the Municipal Court Manager, Captain Cobb and Sgt. Nickell of the Police Department, and Brian Jimenez of Neighborhood Resources, we have developed a tracking system for disorderly house nuisance properties.

As a result, in the month of August the first two disorderly house nuisance abatement conferences were held. In each case, staff members, property owners, occupants and neighbors of nearby properties met to discuss the identified properties. The stated goal of each conference was to attempt to prevent future nuisance behavior from occurring on the identified properties. In each case nuisance abatement agreements were reached. If the conditions in the agreement are subsequently violated, the individuals responsible for the property under the ordinance will be prosecuted in Municipal Court, or in appropriate cases the agreements may be amended to include more restrictive or potentially more effective conditions.

The tracking system remains a work in progress. The system is automated to the extent possible with our current technological assets, but many people must spend significant amounts of time identifying potential properties and then assembling relevant reports and making certain that the properties in question truly qualify under the ordinance. In addition, conferences must be scheduled and notices sent to potentially interested parties. The Municipal Court, Police Department, Legal Services Department, and Neighborhood Resources each must handle every case before the nuisance abatement process is complete. We are working on ways to increase the scope of the coverage of the tracking system and to streamline the processing of the properties that we do identify. I anticipate that from time to time citizens will bring properties to our attention that we have not yet identified as nuisance properties, but we are well equipped to quickly determine the status of those properties.

We are currently initiating the nuisance abatement agreement process on several other properties that we have identified.

The limited citizen feedback we have received to date regarding the process has been positive. If I can answer any other questions, please let me know.