PRESS RELEASE FROM RealDefender

A PUBLICATION EXAMINING PROPERTY CODE ENFORCEMENT AND RELATED ISSUES

For more information, please email RealDefender@outlook.com

Lack of training plays role in unfair property policing

A current battle between Real Property Group, Inc. of Lake Oswego, OR, and the city of Medford, OR, highlights a hidden problem of property code enforcement in the state – a lack of mandated standardized training for code enforcement officials.

Throughout 2013 Real Property Group, Inc. (RPG) was subject to an ongoing – and unwarranted – investigation of alleged property code violations.  Medford Community Service Officer Scott Niezen of the Medford Police Dept. repeatedly displayed malice, incompetence, and laziness as he baselessly and repeatedly cited RPG with alleged code violations at one of its residential properties.

Eventually all the citations were dismissed by the city, but the battle cost RPG and its president, Kevin Curtin, thousands of dollars in legal fees as well as smeared the reputations of both the corporation and Curtin. RPG and Curtin are now demanding that all those involved in this fiasco be held accountable for their actions, most importantly, Niezen, whose treatment of RPG and Curtin is stunning in its mendacity.

Throughout 2013 and into 2014, Niezen repeatedly erred in his inspections of an RPG rental property, displaying a lack of basic knowledge of how heating, electrical and water systems work, among other things. He also failed to properly fill out police reports, misrepresented RPG to the public, flat out lied to a TV station, lied to his superiors, misled a tenant by telling her falsehoods, literally endangered a toddler’s life and essentially presented himself as a case study in exactly how not to be a public official.

Subsequent to Niezen’s attacks on RPG, the Medford police colluded with him by stonewalling RPG’s pursuit for vindication, covering up Niezen’s crimes by failing to note publicly in its annual reports that RPG had made hundreds of sustainable complaints against Niezen.

But it’s not just Niezen who is at fault – he’s the product of a system that has no universal standards to which code enforcement officials must adhere — to the potential detriment of property owners as well as tenants. Indeed, a Medford official admitted to an RPG employee that he had no idea what kind of, if any, training in code enforcement Niezen had. To this day, the Medford Police Department still asks only that its community service officers be familiar with the Oregon Housing Code to qualify as possible code enforcement officers.

Standards? What standards?

When a property owner is cited for an alleged code violation, it’s important the person citing the owner knows what he or she is doing. However, a RealDefender investigation revealed that officials, like Niezen, charged with code enforcement in Oregon are under no state or federal mandate to be professionally certified at all in such areas as building construction, electrical wiring, plumbing, or other related fields. Indeed, there is no federal standard for code enforcement officers, and a number of states, including Oregon, don’t even have state standards. In other words, you could literally know nothing about how a building is built and maintained and still be employed as a code enforcement official in Oregon.

The American Association of Code Enforcement (AACE), in partnership with the International Code Council, states that there are several national certifications for code enforcement professionals.  Through the AACE, code enforcement officials can obtain certifications as a Zoning Inspector, Property Maintenance & Housing Inspector, Code Enforcement Officer, Code Enforcement Administrator and Master Code Enforcement Professional. 

Many code enforcement officers throughout the country are diligent about staying on top of their professional training needs. However, it should be noted that there is no universal federal standard for the certification of code enforcement officers, and that the AACE states certification requirements vary by state.

“Some states, such as California, require code enforcement professionals to hold state certification credentials while other states, such as Ohio, do not require a state certification for code enforcement professionals,” the AACE says. “Additionally, some jurisdictions require or highly encourage AACE/ICC certifications regardless of state requirements (or lack thereof).”

Oregon’s requirements

RealDefender asked a number of officials about Oregon’s code enforcement standards, and found a variety of views on the topic.

For starters, the Oregon Department of Public Safety Standards and Training does not train or certify code enforcement officers.

“Generally speaking, code enforcers are charged with enforcing municipal public health and safety codes which are unique to each community, so their training is the responsibility of the municipality,” says Linsay Hale, the DPSST’s professional standards division director. “To my knowledge there is no standardized state training or certification for code enforcement officers.”

Indeed, there is no standardized test code enforcement officers must take to work in Oregon, according to the Oregon Code Enforcement Association (OCEA), which offers professional support, training, and networking for code enforcement officers.

“Each jurisdiction (typically a municipality or county) has their own requirements for code enforcement,” says Nik Rapelje, the OCEA’s public relations officer. “There is no state certification test required.”

She adds that the OCEA offers four levels of professional certification for members.

Police officers are sometimes employed as code enforcement officials, she adds.

“It is more common in smaller cities and county sheriff departments for an officer or deputy to have code enforcement duties,” she says. “Code enforcement duties can be a part-time assignment for another employee . . . There are several code enforcement officers who also have animal control duties.”

The OCEA is not pushing for standardized training, she says, because “the variety of duties and assignments across the state makes it difficult to justify state standards.” Nonetheless, Rapelje says it’s helpful for code enforcement officers to have experience in government and administration, and that it’s common for CEOs to have backgrounds in building codes and law enforcement.

“OCEA has focused on providing training for our members and has not pushed for state-mandated standards,” she says.

Up to code

Given there are no universal standards for CEOs, what do the experts in code enforcement think a CEO should nonetheless know before taking on the job? RealDefender asked Bryan Wagner, the AACE’s second vice president and contact for Oregon, what he thought made for a good CEO. He listed the following qualities:

1. zoning and property maintenance issues.

Using these criteria, Real Defender has concluded it is time for the state of Oregon to investigate Scott Niezen as well as the city of Medford’s code enforcement program. Because if one thing is clear, Niezen should not be working in code enforcement.