Cape Coral City Council moved ahead Wednesday with a plan to crack down on unlicensed contractors with a dedicated inspector and fines for scofflaws.<\/p>\n
Deputy Development Service Director Matthew Grambow said Ordinance 49-26 amends Chapter 6 and updates the language and expedites the enforcement process through the city\u2019s civil citation notice.<\/p>\n
The ordinance states that \u201clocal governing bodies are expressly authorized to enforce codes and ordinances against unlicensed contractors, including a schedule of penalties to be assessed by the Code Enforcement Officer with a maximum civil penalty of $2,000.\u201d It further states that if the \u201ccity\u2019s special magistrate finds that an unlicensed contracting code violation exists, the special magistrate is authorized to order the violator to pay a civil penalty of $2,500 per violation.\u201d<\/p>\n
Grambow said the ordinance preserves all criminal channels for enforcement and allows the city to work with other agencies to pursue enforcement strategy.<\/p>\n
City Manager Michael Ilczyszyn said council had expressed they did not like the level of service the state was providing and directed staff to come up with a way to enhance that level of enforcement \u2014 a mechanism with fee-based funding so they were not taxing the people that do not need permits to provide the service for contractors.<\/p>\n
Ilczyszyn said the question of the ordinance was did the council want to give staff the ability to go after unlicensed contractors. He said if they did not want the city in that business, then they should not pass the ordinance.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe don\u2019t have the capacity to do it today,\u201d Ilczyszyn said.<\/p>\n
Council also approved Resolution 216-26, which creates the licensing investigator classification to add one full-time employee to the Development Services Department to proactively and reactively work to enforce unlicensed contractors.<\/p>\n
The fee -$5 fee \u2014 did not pass unanimously, as Councilmember Rachel Kaduk voted against the motion. The fee funds the licensing investigator.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t support a $5 fee. If this is really important to this body \u2014 fund this position in the budget to make that happen,\u201d Kaduk said, adding that she did not agree with having a fee for every permit and owner going forward. \u201cI am having a hard time with the fee.\u201d<\/p>\n
She was told that the $5 fee would only be applied to the BLD prefix for permits.<\/p>\n
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