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. Neighborhood Nuisance Handbook Page 14 of17 A public nuisance can be: a disorderly house, after-hours establishment, or place where liquor, beer or narcotics are sold illegally, a place where prostitution or gambling take place, or a vacant dilapidated building. The City may not take sufficient action on some public nuisances to satisfy surrounding residents. Under some circumstances, those residents may petition the City to take additional action. A petition to declare a property a public nuisance must be signed by 60% of all owners and tenants one block in any direction around the alleged nuisance. The petition must include: A statement alleging a public nuisance at a specific address, and referring to documents supporting the allegation, at the top of each page of signatures. Each signer's name, address, and whether he or she is an owner, owner-occupant or tenant. Supporting documents or affidavits that there are any or all of the following: noise; litter; parking problems; traffic problems; proof that the peace, comfort or decency of the neighborhood has been disturbed; prostitution; gambling; sale or possession of controlled substances or previous disorderly house operation convictions at the same location. The City Council will schedule a public hearing on allegations in the petition. You and anyone else concerned may appear and testify at the hearing. After the hearing, the Council will either return the petition to the petitioners for insufficient evidence or refer it to the City Attorney's office for legal review. The City Attorney will respond with a report explaining its decision. However, the City Attorney's office will not itself investigate the allegations in the petition. If the public nuisance involves prostitution, gambling, or keeping a disorderly house, and if there have been a number of previous convictions for these offenses in the building, state law permits the City Attorney to request a court order. The court order will close the building for one year, and can remove and sell any movable property. If a building tenant was responsible for a nuisance situation, the property owner can ask the court to order cancellation of the tenant's lease. The person or persons responsible for any nuisance that generates extraordinary cost to the City for excessive consumption of police services such as multiple police visits to a disorderly house may be liable for a police service fee. For more information on what you can do about public nuisance activities, including details on the public nuisance petition procedure, call the City's Citizen Services Office (266-8989). PUBLIC NUISANCE, ZONING A completely different public nuisance is any building or land use, begun after the Zoning Code was adopted in 1922, which violates the Zoning Code. These nuisances can be abated by court order, which could go as far as stopping the improper use or tearing down the building. Call Zoning Information and Enforcement (266-9008) for more information. RATS, COCKROACHES, AND OTHER VERMIN OR PESTS The best way to deal with nuisance animals (such as rats, mice, skunks, snakes, squirrels, bats, black birds, starlings, pigeons, bees, wasps, cockroaches, or flies) is prevention. If the other nuisances discussed in this booklet are taken care of, pests are much less likely to have food and places to breed -- and therefore will not be around. Proper garbage cans, keeping garbage and trash picked up, cutting weeds and tall grass, and stacking fIrewood one foot off the ground are important in controlling pests. http://www . stpau1.gov 1 council/handbook.html 07/06/1999