For Information Contact:

Brian Adey
 798-5800

Oneida County Executive Joseph A. Griffo today announced that he will be adapting the precedent-setting Public Nuisance Law he instituted in Rome to help all communities attack blight and serious codes violations.

"Rome’s Public Nuisance Law, which I proposed and fought to have adopted during my tenure as mayor, has been a model for other communities in New York that have copied and adopted the law as a way to combat properties where repeated violations or criminal activities occur," he said. "Coupled with the Oneida County Sanitary Code that was proposed by former Legislative Majority Leader and now Supreme Court Justice Robert Julian that was designed to provide new enforcement tools to address sub-standard housing and blight, we have a powerful one-two punch that can improve neighborhoods in every community of the county."

Griffo said the Rome Public Nuisance Law and the County Sanitary Code will be reviewed by Oneida County Health Director Eric Faisst, whose department is charged with public health enforcement, to provide a roadmap for the county to take whatever policy actions need to be made so that both laws can be tools for every Oneida County community. He said Faisst will work with local communities and the County Attorney’s Office.

"A community is as strong as its weakest neighborhood," Griffo said. "We must aggressively assist our deteriorating housing stock and revive our struggling neighborhoods. By using all the tools available to us, we can strengthen our neighborhoods, increase housing values and put a stop to blight as soon as it starts. Where neglect has resulted in a property that is such a hazard it must be demolished, we will follow these walk-away owners as far as necessary to recover the costs of demolition and then reinvest that money in our neighborhoods."

Griffo also said that he will work with communities to share lessons learned in Rome, which after years of declines saw increases in its tax base due to neighborhood revival. "First, we need to attack violations. Then, we need to track the violations. Then, we need to take action. The Public Nuisance Law and the Sanitary Code will not change the face of our county unless we act."

Griffo said enforcement of the two laws on a countywide basis will send a message. "Land owners who work with the laws and try to correct problems that can happen in any older property have nothing to fear. These laws are focused on those who willfully ignore their responsibilities and who contribute to neighborhood and community decline."

Griffo also said he wanted to ensure that enforcement of the two laws also helps communities provide property owners with a battery of tools to deal with destructive tenants. "If you wreck it, you pay for it," Griffo said. "That’s a simple standard and we will implement the laws to enforce it and help every community that wants to preserve its neighborhoods do the same."