May 4, 2011
To the Editor:

In response to your story on the eyesores in the community I would like to remind our residents of some of the reasons why.

Some ten to twelve years ago The City Council looked at this problem in depth and several conditions existed.

Neighborhood Preservation Codes is a reactive agency, not proactive, mainly because of budgetary problems. At that time the budget for codes would have to be at least tripled to become proactive.

While it was never stated in public, if you spoke to council members in private they would tell you they get phone call after phone call when a ticket is issued. If we went proactive, concerns were if that would affect their re-electability.

Many of the problems are Land Trust Properties. Land Trust is the most disorganized creation in the history of government. At present, with the increase of foreclosures, we can expect to see statewide a vast increase in these properties. Many towns, counties and cities are concerned and do not wish to see these properties end up in Land Trust. At the present time the east side of the state is looking at some new entity that will work. Kansas City is being bypassed in these discussions due to the partisan politics played in Jackson County and Kansas City, Mo.

Judge Cagel is retiring. This man has been a godsend to the community and if we allow housing court to be combined into the regular court system, can we expect a dedicated effort of the courts to address these problems? I think not.

In my many years as a community activist and many hours working on this problem I have determined one thing that must be done to improve the system. The process needs to be changed that will shorten the time from an initial inspection until a finally resolution of that case file. If we do this we can double the number of inspections with the same manpower. Personally, I would like to see the budget doubled, but being a realist I know that will not happen in these tough economic times.

Charles Melton of Kansas City, Mo.

(Editor’s Note: During our interview with then-Housing Court Judge Wayne Cagle, Cagle said it’s a Housing Court myth that it “it takes forever to get a case heard in Housing Court.” A housing case is heard on average two to three weeks after it’s filed in the Housing Court by the enforcement agency, he said.)