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Proposed Ordinance Amending Chapter 2, Article III, to Revise Procedures Applicable to Prosecution of Code Enforcement Violations
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BRIEF OVERVIEW
The County Attorney's Office has prepared the proposed ordinance at the request of the Code Enforcement Department.
In 2004, Hernando County (the "County") became one the first local governments in the State to appoint a special master to hear its civil code enforcement cases, as opposed to having them decided in County court. That meant that the County could not use another county's code as a model when it drafted the Code Enforcement Ordinance, Hernando County Code Ch. 2, Art. III.
In the first 17 and a half years of its existence, the Code Enforcement Ordinance required the County Attorney's Office to set a hearing for each notice of violation (e.g., the citation) issued if the defendant did not first pay the applicable civil penalty. As a result, the County Attorney's Office set virtually all of the notices for a hearing. Each department incurred costs for each case, including but not limited to, certified mail, case preparation, hearing preparation with the assigned assistant county attorney, preparation time charged by the special master, and the cost of the hearing itself. Most defendants, however, neither attended the hearings nor paid the resulting fines.
On January 11, 2022, the Board of County Commissioners amended the Code Enforcement process by enacting Ordinance 2022-2. Among the changes made by Ordinance 2022-2, it streamlined the code enforcement process by having the County Attorney's Office set hearings only when the defendant contests a citation. Code Enforcement cases now generally proceed as follows:
1. A Code Enforcement officer will identify a violation of the Hernando County Code.
2. Except for repeat violations, irreparable violations, and violations the existence of which threaten public safety, the Code Enforcement officer will give the violator a reasonable time unde...
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