Addressing county blight: What’s next?

Published 9:42 am Monday, June 11, 2018

After nearly a year of back and forth discussions, an effort to find middle ground on the property maintenance code proposal was rejected Tuesday in a 3-2 vote by Baldwin County Commissioners. A lot of work went into drafting this plan, which fell short of winning over the majority of commissioners as well as their constituents. But while the Baldwin County Property Maintenance Code is history, what remains, however, is the blight and rundown properties that sparked debate on the issue to begin with. 

So what’s next?

County officials mustn’t allow this setback to hinder the process of finding a viable solution to the blight issue that plagues this community. Officials need to take a step back, reevaluate and return to the drawing board in figuring out how the code that is already on the books can effectively be enforced for the betterment of the community at-large. They can’t lose sight of the end goal — eliminating unkempt properties that hinder neighborhood improvement and present public health and safety issues within the community.

It took a great deal of time, work and fortitude for county leaders to draft the property maintenance code proposal and put it out for a vote. Doing so certainly didn’t win county officials any popularity votes but that is often the risk taken by those charged with leading. As leaders, it is their responsibility to bring others to the table to find solutions in an effort to make the community better. That requires new ideas that sometimes aren’t popular, and sometimes those ideas fall through. But that doesn’t mean we throw up our hands and walk away. The community, county leaders included, can’t continue to punt this issue downfield. As leaders, county officials must bring others who have a vested interest in this issue to the table in order to figure out how to strengthen the existing codes and make them more effective. Some good points were brought to the forefront during the series of public hearings held on this issue. Officials should take note and use some of those ideas and public concerns to solidify the existing code and make change for the better. How about bringing some of those opposed to the failed code changes to the table to hear their ideas?

No doubt, the failed property maintenance proposal was an emotionally-charged issue for a large contingent of the community, but it’s time to take a deep breath and not allow the emotions involved to squelch new ideas for improvement.

There are no winners if there is never any progress.