The Eastern Oregon city of Ontario is waiving over $1 million in unpaid fines and penalties stemming from its nuisance abatement rules.
City nuisance abatement policies typically regulate garbage and weeds at businesses and homes. Some say Ontario’s rules were too strict and vague. Its own mayor in 2019 sued the city over a $500 fine and won.
In June this year, the city settled a lawsuit with the Oregon Law Center, a legal-aid nonprofit, in a case involving two clients: Heriberta Contreras Granados and Susan Ragsdale.
The legal complaint says the city failed to send notices to Contreras Granados in Spanish, even though that’s her primary language. She later tried paying the city’s penalties, the complaint says, but the city put a nearly $10,000 lien on her property.
“These are prohibitive amounts of money for our clients to pay,” attorney Emily Teplin Fox said in an interview with OPB. “They just don’t have it; they can’t pay it down. And it’s completely disproportionate to the types of property nuisances at issue here.”
It was also unclear how the city wanted Contreras Granados to improve her home, Teplin Fox said. The city’s notice said Contreras Granados had “outdoor storage of non-trash items,” but it didn’t explain what those items were, according to the complaint.
The notices were especially difficult for Contreras Granados to understand because they were only in English. Compared to many other Oregon cities, Ontario has a significant Spanish-speaking population; almost half of its 11,600 residents identify as Hispanic or Latino, according to U.S. Census data.
The city first sent a notice to Contreras Granados listing violations that added up to a total fine of $4,950. A second set of penalties added another $7,800. Contreras Granados worked with her daughter to address the violations, the legal complaint says. A code enforcement officer returned to the home and said there were still violations, then “pointed out a weed that she had missed,” the complaint reads. The city then put a $9,950 lien on her property.
Teplin Fox’s other client, Susan Ragsdale, faced $700 in fines. Teplin Fox said she had physical disabilities that made it difficult for her to comply with the city’s weed abatement rules.
Teplin Fox said city rules like these are common, and they need to do a better job of accommodating people’s diverse needs.
“When cities develop and effectuate their nuisance abatement policies, they need to make sure that they’re going about it in an even-handed way that doesn’t punish people for just being poor, or for just being people with disabilities, or people with limited English proficiency,” Teplin Fox said. “They need to develop systems that are fair and that account for the diversity of their citizenship and the homeowners in their communities.”
Ontario officials will pay $39,300 in damages to Contreras Granados, $700 in damages to Ragsdale, and $15,000 in attorney fees and costs. They’ve also halted enforcement of the city’s current nuisance abatement policies while a committee reviews potential changes.