San Antonio Report
by Andrea Drusch
For the next six months, the City of San Antonio plans to cut seniors some slack on code violations like overgrown lawns and hazardous trees in their yards.
The city allocated $100,000 in its 2024 fiscal year budget to cover the cost of addressing the violations — instead of issuing citations — for residents who are 65 or older, as well as disabled residents, who can’t do the work themselves and can’t afford to hire it out.
“The goal of this is to protect our vulnerable population,” Development Services Director Michael Shannon told the City Council’s Planning and Community Development Committee Monday. “We don’t really want them to receive code enforcement citations.”
When a code violation is found, enforcement officers typically give residents 10 days to address an issue before the resident receives a citation and is asked to appear in court.
Fines for a code violation citation range from $300 to $500, and the resident can also be billed for work performed by city personnel or contractors to bring the property up to code.
Under the new program, code enforcement officers will help qualified residents apply for assistance when the first notice is issued. If approved, the resident’s case will be closed without a bill from the city or a citation.
“Our goal is compliance, not to cite people, especially those that if they had the means or ability they would [address the problem],” Shannon said. “We know [there are residents] out there that really need assistance, rather than a list of citations and going to court.”
Council members on the committee voted unanimously to advance the plan.
A 2021 study from the University of Texas at Austin School of Law found San Antonio far surpasses other large Texas cities in issuing orders to vacate and demolish homes, with a disproportionate impact on low-income people of color.
The program approved Monday is only focused on small-scale code violations averaging $700 to repair, such as overgrown vegetation, alley maintenance, trash or debris and dead or dying trees.
It’s one of a number of programs the city has instituted since the 2021 study, however, to rethink San Antonio’s approach to code enforcement.
“We’ve all heard time and time again heartbreaking stories of our older adults and disabled residents not being able to maintain their yards and then being cited for it,” said Councilwoman Marina Alderete Gavito (D7), who pushed the city to fund the idea with surplus CPS Energy revenue. “This pilot program will finally be able to change the direction that we as a city take when it comes to interactions between code enforcement and our older adults and disabled adults.”
The city previously had a $15,000 budget to help residents who needed assistance resolving a code violation.
The new six-month pilot will allow the city to study its needs at scale, providing data on how many violations involve seniors and disabled residents who don’t have the means to address them.
“We don’t necessarily track that right now,” Shannon said. “After this program, I think we’ll have a little bit better idea as to all the code cases that we run into, how many have needed this service? How many requested this service?”
The $100,000 will be split evenly among the 10 City Council districts. The pilot program is open to both renters and homeowners, but recipients will need to fill out a form explaining why they need assistance.
“The idea for this program is to help them out maybe once or twice a year if an issue has come up,” Shannon said. “If we think this is going to be a longer-term need,” Development Services will look into “what other city or non-city services might be available, and how to connect those residents.”