BY TIMOTHY LA ROCHE
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CLAREMONT — Two landlords with several Claremont properties will potentially face steep fines after a judge ruled against them this month.
Judge Brian Tucker issued a decision in favor of the City of Claremont in a civil suit against Ruben Ramirez and Jessica Ramirez. Between the couple’s 23 rental properties in the city, code inspectors identified more than 80 uncorrected code violations in 12 buildings. As of the city’s motion for entry of final decree on Jan. 29, more than 25 code violations remained across 11 properties.
“Defendants seemingly preferred to incur fines rather than address violations in a timely manner, treating fines as a business expense for abating code violations on if and when they saw fit,” the city’s motion states. “Intervention by this court is necessary to enforce timely code compliance by Defendants.”
The couple is ordered to correct all code violations, comply with all deadlines imposed by city officials to abate any new code violations and refrain from working at their properties without required permits. They have 30 days to comply with the judgment or be held in possible contempt of court.
Citing RSA 676:17, I, the city seeks civil penalties of $275 for the first day of each offense and $550 for each additional day of offenses until the date that the respondents fix the violations. As of Jan. 29, at least 25 violations remained unabated across 11 buildings.
The city also seeks reimbursement of all attorney’s fees, inspection fees, expert fees and investigatory expenses.
“Absent sufficient motivation supplied by the Court, it is likely that the Defendants will continue to fail to address the remaining violations or any newly-arising code violations at all, or only in an untimely manner,” the motion stated.
The city filed its complaint against the couple on July 24, with a summons being issued the following day. The Grafton County Sheriff’s Department served Ramirez the summons on Aug. 1, but the defendants never filed an appearance or response. The court entered a final default in the case on Oct. 2.
According to court documents, neither of the respondents reside in their properties nor do they operate businesses out of them. While many of the properties are currently occupied by tenants, others are vacant.
Court documents allege that the couple was contacted several times by city staff to correct such issues as fire code violations, noncode-compliant work, rodent infestation and other potential safety hazards. According to court documents, their failure to correct the violations exposed residential tenants to “sub-standard living conditions and fire hazards while they wait for repair.”
On April 26, the city identified 35 violations across 12 of the properties that had been subject to prior notices of violations and were left uncorrected. The couple was ordered to abate the violations no later than 10 days after the notice was received, but no violations had yet been corrected as of the July 24 complaint.
The city later identified eight additional violations at the couple’s property on 78 Hanover St. and issued another notice of violation on May 19 through the mail. However, neither respondent signed for the delivery of the notice. On June 12, a copy of that notice was hand-delivered, and the couple was ordered to abate the violations within 10 days of receipt. None of the violations had been corrected as of July 24.
On Feb. 1, 2017, the city identified five fire code violations at the couple’s 13 High St. property. The notice of violation was delivered on Feb. 6, and an inspection was scheduled for the property on March 14. Court documents state, however, that the couple postponed the inspection to May 16 and then to June 2 and again to July 27.
The city also sent the couple a notice of violation on Feb. 13, 2017 after inspectors found 30 fire code violations at their property at 30 High St. The re-inspection of the property was scheduled originally for April 14 and then May 17, but the respondents requested that the inspection be rescheduled for May 16 to coincide with the inspections on 13 High St. As with the other property, he requested postponements of the inspections to June 2 and then July 27.
On June 12, a building inspector discovered an inch of standing water and sewage in the basement of the couple’s 10 Royce St. building due to a leak and failure of a sewer ejector.
On June 27, the building inspector also found that unpermitted electrical work had been done at their 162 Washington St. property despite the city issuing several stop work orders.
“In the six months since this action was filed, the City’s code enforcement officials have continued to attempt to work with the Defendants to have code violations cured and inspected,” the Jan. 29 motion for final decree said. “Progress has been very slow.”
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