Nome considers new rules for vacant properties

An aerial view of Nome. (Photo courtesy David Dodman)
An aerial view of Nome. (Photo courtesy David Dodman)

The city of Nome is considering creating a registry of vacant properties in the city and a list of maintenance requirements for property owners.

With one-third of the buildings in Nome vacant, City Planner Eileen Bechtol said dealing with abandoned structures is the number one request from the public after a citywide survey last August.

Building inspector Greg Smith says the registry is also about public safety.

The city needs “maintenance and security requirements in order to protect the public, which we don’t have on the books anywhere,” Smith said.

“And the police are responding more and more to young kids, going into vacant buildings, playing with matches … we got a problem!”

Smith said the registry would give the city a list of whom to contact for any issues that might come up involving abandoned buildings. The city would also lay out maintenance regulations, for example: what a property owner would be responsible for after a fire in or near one of the derelict structures. Smith said similar registries have been used successfully in other Alaska communities.

The city planning commission’s docket included additional language that could fill gaps in Nome’s city code, Smith said. “It also goes into definitions of junk, debris, how you can leave a lot … stuff we don’t have.”

In a meeting, council members countered that it’s tricky business to define “junk” or “debris” in a town like Nome. Some said the new rules could be incentives to clean up properties or even leverage favorable property tax rates on structures that aren’t abandoned.

The vacant building registry is just a first step, the start of a conversation. The city is also considering strengthening the city’s rules on grandfathering property to comply with the community’s relatively new zoning laws established in 2007.

 

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