Watkins approves property law

WATKINS GLEN--The Watkins Glen board of trustees passed a new law Tuesday, June 15 that allows the village to regulate vacant commercial and residential properties. Along with setting the criteria for determining whether a property is vacant or not, the new law also determines a penalty fine schedule for property owners found to have a vacant property.
"If somebody just abandons their building and it starts to deteriorate and they haven't secured it up or they started working on it and they let the permit lapse and it starts to become a hazard in the neighborhood, we never had anything on the books where we could cite or fine them for that, now we do," Watkins Glen Mayor Luke Leszyk said.
Prior to the vote, which was unanimous, the board held a public hearing where no member of the public spoke.
Along with going through the regulations of how a vacant property is determined, there is also a fine schedule established. In the first year, owners of residential buildings can be fined up to $400 while commercial property owners can be fined up to $800. The final amount on the schedule is $1,000 per year for residential owners and $2,000 for commercial owners.
Key to the new law are provisions that give the village the ability to determine what houses are vacation or partial year houses as opposed to fully vacant.
"You have to distinguish between the people who are snowbirds who empty out their house for six months a year," Leszyk said. "It's more along the lines where people purchase a building or house and start to work on it and stop and now you have open windows, rodents start occupying it and then it becomes a nuisance to the neighborhood."
Officials from Larson Design Group gave an update to the board on how they have altered the $9 million water infrastructure upgrade project in order to ensure that costs don't run out of control. Cost is of particular interest to Leszyk, who said the village is actively seeking grants to pay roughly $7 million of the project and covering the rest with a zero-interest loan.
With the pending opening of Clute Park and ever-increasing costs, the board voted to help the Watkins Glen Area Chamber of Commerce pay for fireworks at the park on July 4.
"We are going to have an open house for the event center on July 3 to let people go through and [see it]," Leszyk mentioned.
"They are finishing up little tidbits here and there...we want that to be our first real celebration since the start of the pandemic," Leszyk added.