Code Enforcement

A zoning complaint that started as political mud slung during last year's County Council campaign has again become an issue of political strife.Neighbors in Pasadena of County Councilwoman Shirley Murphy have appealed a decision by the Anne Arundel County Planning and Code Enforcement Department that an old guest house on her property on June Lane is legal.During the council campaign last year, then-County Councilman Thomas Redmond filed a zoning complaint against Murphy one month before Election Day, charging that she was improperly using the cottage as an apartment in an area not zoned for apartments.

IN his nationwide search for a housing commissioner, Mayor Martin O'Malley should insist on an individual who has a battle plan for two dire neighborhood problems:How to deal with owners, large and small, who ignore city codes and let their property deteriorate horribly.How to stop the city government from spreading neighborhood decay through its neglect of derelict properties it controls.In many areas of Baltimore, these are huge, interconnected problems. Why should a private property owner heed codes when city properties next door are in violation and have been for years?

Three Anne Arundel County Council members said yesterday they were disturbed that a county land-use inspector broke environmental laws in building his own home in a sensitive area near a tributary of the Chesapeake Bay.But the county's top land-use officer said inspector Bryan M. Lang's failure to obtain proper permits to build a home near Rock Creek in Pasadena was an isolated incident and not a sign that county inspectors are generally lax in enforcing environmental...

Garden snakes, dead rats and scrap metal have led to the lengthiest jail sentence in Baltimore's history of code enforcement violations for a Park Heights man, authorities say.Alan Verschleisser, who owns Potter's Salvage, could be released today from the Baltimore City Detention Center. He was sentenced to 30 days for civil contempt. Twenty days of the sentence were suspended, but if Verschleisser fails to clean up the scrap yard at his Baker Street property in West Baltimore by Oct. 22, he would serve the rest of the sentence.

The Baltimore County firefighters union assailed yesterday the promotion of two top-level firefighters with ties to County Executive C. A. Dutch Ruppersberger, fraying the union's strained relationship with the executive.The union -- which in recent years has picketed Ruppersberger over his salary offers and fought his efforts to restructure the department -- said qualified candidates were unfairly shut out of consideration for the $80,000 deputy chief jobs because the administration made its choices months before the official selection process began.

HUNT VALLEY -- The final health department flu and pneumonia clinic will be held at the Lodge at Oregon Ridge Park on from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. Wednesday.The cost is $8 for flu shots and $16 for pneumonia vaccinations, which are covered by Medicare.Information: 410-887-2723.Department of Aging seeks volunteers to be ombudsmenTOWSONTOWSON -- The county's Department of Aging is seeking volunteers for its Long Term Care Ombudsman Program, which trains advocates to investigate problems in nursing homes and assisted-living facilities and to resolve them with residents, families and personnel.

The following is the schedule of Anne Arundel County hearings on zoning reclassifications, special exceptions and variances.The following will be held before administrative hearing officers in County Council Chambers, 44 Calvert St., Annapolis:Aug. 2010: 30 a.m. -- Peter Ponne, to permit a deck addition with narrower setbacks than required on property along the south side of Bay Hills Drive, south of Mystic Lane in Arnold.Aug. 279: 30 a.m. -- Theresa Duffy and Terrance Shaw, to permit a dwelling addition with narrower setbacks than required on property along the north side of Jasper Court, east of Jasper Lane in Crofton.

RESIDENTS have a rare opportunity to plan the future of their communities. They shouldn't forfeit it.Although complaining about poor planning is a popular pastime, the audiences have been pathetic at meetings of Anne Arundel County's small area planning process.Last week, for example, a forum in Crofton drew a smattering of a couple of dozen people.Crofton residents who did not show up lost an opportunity to hear about future projects, potential land-use changes and public improvements planned for their community.

Homebuilders came up against county residents opposed to development last night as the Anne Arundel County Council considered a measure that would virtually halt the approval of new residential subdivisions in areas where schools are overcrowded.The bill, introduced at the request of County Executive John G. Gary, would bring county planning policy in line with school board policy by allowing planning officials to consider the capacity of individual elementary, middle or high schools, instead of looking at the capacity of an entire feeder system of schools.

Anne Arundel County prosecutors have quietly opened a criminal probe into how $4,375 in payments came to be missing from the licensing division of the county land use office.The state's attorney's office investigation was prompted by an audit in March that found no record of the money going into the county account after it had been taken from customers in exchange for one-day Planning and Code Enforcement licenses for roadside stands, hucksters and parades.A criminal inquiry into a county office in the Republican administration in an election year is a touchy matter.

The problem:: A hole in an East Baltimore sidewalk remained unfilled for four months. The back story:: Harvey Levy owns the Sportsmart on Exeter Street, a family business for 30 years. He noticed a hole in the sidewalk in the 400 block of N. Gay St., near Orleans Street, in April and called 311 to report it. The opening, edged in metal, looked like any number of water meter vaults found elsewhere in the city - except the cover was missing. When Levy saw that prompt action had not been taken, he called back.

THE PROBLEM: : Overgrown bushes and weeds block pedestrians' path on a sidewalk in Northeast Baltimore. THE BACK STORY: : The grass is green and lush on Sinclair Lane. Unfortunately, so are the weeds and shrubs. Lottie Sweat walks north on Sinclair Lane, in neighborhood of Frankford, to get to the post office at least once a week. But for months, weeds and other greenery growing taller and wider have encroached on the sidewalk along a short stretch between Parkside Drive and Bowleys Lane, requiring pedestrians to detour into the roadway.

Trash court was in session, and for Robin Patterson, that meant an opportunity to solemnly swear, in effect, I am not a slob. Patterson didn't have to be in that downtown Baltimore hearing room. He could have simply paid the $50 fine for the garbage spotted behind his Northwest Baltimore home. But the maintenance worker says money is tight. Besides, he felt wrongly accused, so he had demanded a hearing. "I clean my yard twice a week," he explained with a note of indignation to Administrative Judge Patricia D. Welch.

A local Baltimore TV station is going to court to get a copy of the videotaped confession of John Gaumer, who was convicted in May for raping and beating to death a woman he met online. The station, in a petition filed in May in Baltimore County Circuit Court, said it had requested but been denied a DVD containing those portions of Gaumer's confession that were played to the jury. The station's lawyer argues that under Maryland law, all evidence used in a trial, including electronic media, is part of the public record unless there are compelling reasons to exclude it. A hearing is set Monday on the station's case.

A politically connected Baltimore contractor has been ordered to shave down a mountainous pile of construction and demolition debris that has become an eyesore for residents of a Northwest Baltimore neighborhood. The debris sits on land in the 3000 block of W. Cold Spring Lane that is used by P&J Contracting, a firm owned by Pless B. Jones Sr. On Tuesday, city officials hit Jones with three violation notices and gave him 30 days to fix the problems. Neighborhood residents say the debris pile had been growing for more than a year.

ISSUE: Last week, we asked readers for their opinions on whether an Anne Arundel County man - Daryl C. Wagner - should be forced to tear down a 3,500- square-foot home he built without county approval on Little Island. Wagner is seeking retroactive variances for the house, which replaced a previous structure on the nearly 2-acre island. But some believe he should have to demolish the structure, which sits within a so-called "critical area" near the shoreline. Here is a sampling of responses: County should enforce its codes Not only should Mr. Wagner's petition not be granted, but any other current projects with which he is associated should be shut down and he should never be allowed to build in this county again.

AMID ALL THE good news about Baltimore's housing boom and its optimistic implications for the city's future, the bad news about the low-cost rental market is enough to put a damper on any enthusiastic forecasts. About 40,000 low-income renters live in substandard housing and can barely afford low rents of under $400 that half of all city rentals charge. There are two poor renters for every affordable rental and 22,000 people on waiting lists for public housing, rental assistance or both.

Sophia Jennings was motoring down Carney's Ridgely Avenue this month in her blue pickup, on her way to investigate a complaint of a code violation, when she noticed the tall grass and tangled weeds. In the midst of a neighborhood of mostly manicured lawns, the several-feet-high brush surrounding a boarded-up house stuck out - so much so that the Baltimore County code enforcement officer took note of the address and filed a complaint. "I just looked and thought, `Yuck,'" she said. She's not alone.

The Baltimore County Council approved legislation last night to expand a pilot program to inspect and license rental properties into five neighborhoods in Towson, Loch Raven and Perry Hall - and the council chairman said the members should consider taking the program countywide The measure adds Loch Raven Village, Rodgers Forge, Ridgeleigh, Towson Manor Village and a Perry Hall community near Seven Oaks Elementary School to five east-side communities included...

The city's housing department has launched an aggressive citywide effort to force owners of approximately 6,000 vacant houses on stable streets to sell or repair their properties - or else. Vacant housing has long been one of Baltimore's most intractable problems and a blight that deters private investment in some city neighborhoods, especially when boarded-up properties are peppered along otherwise healthy blocks. "These vacant houses are like a cancer on the block," said Eric Booker, the department's chief of housing inspections.