City of Beatrice starts ball rolling on tougher junked vehicle code

BEATRICE – A tougher stance on abandoned or junked vehicles is moving forward, in Beatrice. City elected officials gave partial approval Tuesday night to a code amendment that would increase fines for violators.

The proposal came from a special committee on city codes, chaired by Councilman Gary Barnard. "The committee agreed on it, unanimously. We can always go back and revisit some of these but when we're changing these codes, we always have to keep in mind other people's rights...and what they do on their property that adversely affects their neighbor's property. This is probably the best we're going to get done right now, but we can always revisit it, if there's a problem that keeps persisting."

The proposed ordinance, which has to clear two more rounds to gain final approval, would clean up language in the city’s current ordinance dealing with junked vehicles. City Administrator Tobias Tempelmeyer says there’s also a move to improve enforcement. "We added some language in there making it unlawful to interfere with enforcement of this article. Basically, we took that language that it in your nuisance ordinance that says the same thing, and we included it, in here."
The proposed ordinance would add boats and watercraft to the junked vehicle definition in city ordinance.

Under the plan, current fines of $100, $200 and $500 for a first, second and third offense……would increase to $250, $375 and $500. The maximum fine would remain at $500. Each day an abandoned or junked vehicle problem is not remedied would be considered a separate offense in the schedule of fines.

Council passage on first round means citizens have some extra time to weigh in on the subject, according to Councilman Tim Fralin. "It wasn't all that long ago we were accused of rushing everything through the system and this is an opportunity for those people when we do this...and we're only reading it once by title tonight...to come to a meeting and voice your opinion on the stuff that we're changing. If you don't voice your opinion, then we're not going to know how you really feel. There's 25 open seats in here tonight, so the next time we put this on the agenda, I would hope that if somebody has an issue with this kind of particular code or any other codes we change going forward...that they come and speak their piece."

Councilman Ted Fairbanks expressed concern that reoccurring problems have generally been addressed on a complaint-basis…which he considers a flaw in city ordinances. "If you had to wait until somebody complained about somebody running a stop sign in front of you, then why doesn't anyone get pulled over for running a stop sign? That would never get done. So, I don't understand why you have to wait until a citizen complains about something that happens in their neighborhood or next door to them."

The city’s Community Development Department enforces rules such as those on abandoned or junked vehicles, but police and other city employees can also report such problems, if they observe them.