This foreclosed house at 645 Rodriguez St. became one of the city’s exhibits to support a new Abandoned Residential Property Registration Ordinance.

That vacant home on the corner with overgrown grass and a real estate sign in the yard — its days are numbered, according to the City Council.

Not that the City Council can do anything about a glut of foreclosed homes, but the next best thing, city staff said, is to pass an ordinance that requires lenders to maintain and oversee these unoccupied properties.

Homes left vacant by foreclosure in Watsonville will require routine maintenance and inspections as well as a posting of contact information, the City Council decided by launching the adoption of an ordinance related to abandoned residential properties.

“It provides an opportunity for neighbors themselves to do some policing on their own and have a contact there,” said Community Development Director John Doughty. “What these ordinances are doing is requiring a sign be posted on the window to let the neighbors know exactly who the maintenance company is.”

An ordinance to register abandoned residential properties, which passed on its first of three City Council readings Tuesday, also will require property managers to keep foreclosed homes from becoming neighborhood eyesores by complying with local regulations.

Registration fees will cover the cost of the program and allow the city to conduct its code enforcement oversight of these properties, Doughty said.

In the week of Jan. 31 to Feb. 6, 120 homes went into foreclosure in Santa Cruz County, according to Dori Rose Inda, executive director of the Watsonville Law Center, a nonprofit organization that provides legal services to low-income families and individuals. Of those 120 foreclosed homes, 44 were in Watsonville, she said.

The city’s community development department estimated that 742 homes today are “distressed” or in various stages of foreclosure in Watsonville. Doughty said an ordinance could build in accountability.

“Registration requires that maintenance responsibilities fall squarely on the bank because the bank is the one that provided questionable loans in many of these situations,” Doughty told the City Council.

“This is the perfect example of the principle of the broken window. …” said City Councilmember Manuel Bersámin. “Once you let the community start to break the windows, (the problem) grows, it spreads.”

While the first vote on the ordinance was unanimous, not every member of the City Council agreed with the way Watsonville is approaching the broader issue of housing.

The city’s general plan calls for up to 600 housing units on the future growth area of Atkinson Lane, about 65 acres outside the city limits that were identified for future development. Tonight from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. at All Saints Episcopal Church, the public is invited to an informational meeting about the Atkinson Lane development.

City Councilmember Greg Caput said, “I have one general question: Will building 650 homes in the Atkinson area further distress the market?”

Doughty responded that the mortgage crisis was a separate problem related to loose and sometimes illegal lending practices, not to land-use planning. After Tuesday’s meeting, he explained that the Atkinson Lane development would not start before 2010.

“We are working on a plan to deal with this, it’s a long-term plan. We’re looking at future generational development as opposed to dealing with current market conditions,” he said.

Others on the City Council wondered what the city could do to help mortgage holders who lost their homes to foreclosure. Suzanne Isé, redevelopment manager for the city, pointed out that the city is hosting a homebuyer workshop for low- and moderate-income homebuyers and others on May 1 from 5-7 p.m. in the Community Room of the Watsonville Civic Plaza. The city has been involved in other educational outreach concerning the mortgage crisis, she said.

Inda said the Watsonville Law Center continues to help victims of the mortgage crisis but added that one area of need was with counseling. Homebuyers who find themselves in foreclosure and dealing with banks frequently need assistance, she said.

“Homeowners that are calling aren’t sophisticated and don’t have the language skills or even know the terms that will trigger the right conversation with the right person, and they really need assistance with that,” Inda said.

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*Photo by Tarmo Hannula*

(Published in 4/24/08 edition)

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