MEETING NOTES page 1 of 2 Location: Dallas City Hall Date: April 5, 2011 Prepared by: Nigel Brown

Subject: Briefing on Livability in The Cedars

Refer to the Agenda (attached) for an outline of the meeting. Michael Barrett presented “From Eyesores to Assets” (attached) regarding efforts in other U.S. cities to address vacant properties. Pauline Medrano noted that many vacant properties are held by long-term owners who are holding them for speculation. Many have violations for Code, weeds and trash. She referenced the book “Eden’s Lost and Found” which addresses efforts to clean up vacant properties. The suggested strategy is to start with a small area and expand in phases. Pame la Ashford is the umbrella coordinator for this effort. Michael Przekwas presented results of his recent survey regarding quality of life in The Cedars (attached). The report includes a map of DPD reporting areas within the neighborhood. The issues with the most responses include loitering, litter and truck traffic. Deputy Chief Genovese asked that any reports of truck traffic include the time of day and the day of the week in addition to the location. Michael Przekwas discussed the concept of identifying a “captain” for each reporting area. Some areas in the southwest are predominantly business occupancies and would need businesses to participate. Pauline Medrano pointed out that these areas are adjacent to the Trinity River, including bike trails and the “standing wave”. These areas will attract increasing traffic along Riverfront and Corinth. Pauline Medrano and Michael Przekwas commented on prompt response from Oncor regarding repair of streetlights. Michael Barrett spoke about the upcoming neighborhood litter clean-up. Pauline Medrano advised that the City has a list of volunteer organizations that are looking for opportunities to participate. She will ask Forest Turner to provide a contact. In addition, Keep Dallas Beautiful will provide supplies for the clean-up. Michael Barrett commended the DPD for their strong response to reported crime in the Ervay Street corridor. He asked about whether this level of enforcement is sustainable. Deputy Chief Genovese said that this level of enforcement can be maintained. Michael Barrett discussed the concept of using electronic funds transfer instead of cash to pay day-labor workers. Pauline Medrano expressed concern for the workers who are being preyed upon because they leave work with cash in their pockets. Is legislation possible? Attorneys will want to know whether this has been done in other cities as a precedent.

MEETING NOTES page 2 of 2 Lt. King presented a summary of recent police efforts. These include approaching loiterers and frequent drive-bys with a paddy wagon. Recent arrests are predominantly drug paraphernalia, shopping carts and public intoxication. Very few traffic(vehicle) issues. They have also been moving trucks off Cesar Chavez for overnight parking. Need to engage owners of apartments south of Dallas Heritage Village. Pauline Medrano suggested using sky towers on an intermittent basis for visibility. DART has recently installed cameras at the Cedars light-rail station. Michael Barrett discussed the possibility of a Styrofoam ordinance. This has been done in other cities (see Freeport, Maine attached). Also discussed that there are feeding services at multiple locations in the neighborhood, causing a stream of people moving from one location to the next. Discussed the need for feeding organizations to clean up after themselves. There are also several sites handing out clothing that gets discarded along the roadsides. Discussed the possibility of using video for monitoring and reporting violations.

Councilmember Pauline Medrano, DPD and Cedars Neighborhood Association Meeting

Tuesday April 5th

, 2011 3 - 4pm, Dallas City Hall - 5EN

Special Thanks to Deputy Chief Genovesi, Deputy Chief Golbeck, Lt King, Sargent Bynum, and

Officer Owens .

1. DCAD Demographic information

241 Business

258 Houses, Townhomes and Condo owner’s

Coming soon – MSW -165 Affordable housing units

474 Vacant lots – Case Studies

http://www.nhi.org/online/issues/146/researchupdate.html

2. Cedars Neighborhood Association Quality of Life Survey Results

Litter

Loitering

Drug activity

Code violations

Graffiti

3. Cedars Quality of Life Initiatives

Completed

Review and submit Street Light needs – 3/9/11

Vacant Lot review – 3/8/22

Loving My Community Project plan -3/31/11

VIP Training – 3/8/11

QOL survey – 3/15/11

Upcoming

Graffiti Wipe out – May 2011

Neighborhood Clean-up May 2011

Reporting trash and code violation – On-going

www.cnadallas.com website refresh

4. Sustainability of existing police support

DPD long term focus on Cedars Hot spots

o Areas with statistically high number of offenses

o Movement patterns-Ervay, Harwood

Funding

.

5. City Attorney's office - LEGISLATION possibilities:

Day Labor Agencies Legislation

i. Place workers on a direct deposit program

1. Wal-Mart has installed a special banking program called Second Chances for

instance - and it is teaching people that have never had a bank account before,

how to do so.

ii. Or an EFT debit card system

iii. Or a daily payroll service.

iv. Plus legislation stating cash checking stores would not be allowed within a few thousand

feet of a day labor agency

Styrofoam Ordinance

6. Next Steps

Issue #146, Summer 2006 - From Eyesores to Assets - CDC Abandoned Property Strategies

By Alan Mallach

Anticipating Change

As Pat Morrissy, executive director of Housing and Neighborhood Development Services, Inc. (HANDS), a

community development corporation in Orange, New Jersey, tells people, vacant lots and abandoned

buildings “can suck the life out of a neighborhood.” They impair the health of neighborhood residents,

encourage criminal activity and raise the risk of fires. They reduce property values and make already

struggling neighborhoods less appealing to prospective homebuyers who can choose where they live. Of

all the physical factors blighting the lives of inner-city residents, abandoned properties may be the single

most destructive, because they affect so many other conditions, making these other challenging

problems that much worse.

Because vacant properties have such an impact, a strategy that focuses on them can transform an entire

neighborhood, building the opportunity to create vibrant, economically diverse communities. As a

result, as CDCs have looked at conditions in their neighborhoods and worked with residents to frame

rebuilding strategies, vacant and abandoned properties have increasingly become a major part of their

efforts. As Morrissy says, “to save a neighborhood that’s in danger of going down, you can’t simply add

new homes. You have to put the process of decline in reverse.”

Vacant Lots

In the late 1990s, residents of Southwest Baltimore came together to plan for the revitalization of their

community, a neighborhood of 20,000 residents west of the city’s downtown. One of their first concerns

was the number of overgrown vacant lots riddled with trash and debris throughout the neighborhood.

“They were the first thing people saw when they came into the neighborhood,” recalls Zach Holl,

program director for the Bon Secours of Maryland Foundation, which spearheaded the effort. “Ten

percent of the neighborhood was vacant lots, and they looked like hell.” For a community determined to

rebuild its housing market and attract a diverse population, these lots, created as abandoned houses

were torn down, were a major obstacle.

The result was an innovative Open Space Management Program, bringing together community and

outside partners to turn the neighborhood’s vacant lots from a neighborhood eyesore into a community

asset. In the first year, they turned 185 vacant lots into attractive, well-maintained open spaces, while

acquiring an additional 40 lots for reuse for side yards and other purposes. Bon Secours enlisted a wide

range of partner organizations – including Civic Works, a nonprofit youth service organization, which

carried out site improvements and major maintenance; the Community Law Center, which provided

legal assistance; and the Neighborhood Design Center, which helped with lot design and selection of

plant materials. Although the City of Baltimore was initially skeptical about the effort, they soon realized

its value and provided a variety of helpful support services to Operation ReachOut SouthWest (OROSW),

the community’s umbrella organization.

For the program’s organizers, this was about more than just vacant lots. It was about market building

and community pride. After the program had gotten off the ground with staff involvement, the

community became more engaged. From the beginning, OROSW has sponsored “Clean and Green”

competitions, where neighborhood residents form teams that take responsibility for at least five lots

and compete for valuable awards that are handed out each year at a banquet and award ceremony.

As cities move aggressively to demolish abandoned buildings, more and more vacant lots are created,

often replacing one problem with another. In 1975, Philadelphia contained 30,000 abandoned buildings

and only 6,000 vacant lots; by 2001, it still had roughly 30,000 abandoned buildings, but over 30,000

vacant lots. As fast as buildings were being torn down, more were being abandoned, while the lots were

gathering trash and debris. One organization that decided to do something about it was the New

Kensington CDC (NKCDC), an organization serving a cluster of distressed neighborhoods – Kensington,

Fishtown and Port Richmond – northeast of Center City. By 1995, this one area contained over 1,100

vacant lots, ranging from postage stamp lots to abandoned one-time industrial tracts.

As in Southwest Baltimore, the CDC realized that these lots were not only health and safety hazards,

they discouraged nearby owners from fixing up their properties and prompted anyone who could afford

the move to leave the neighborhood. In 1996, the CDC started its Vacant Land Management program,

with technical support from the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society and a combination of CDBG and

foundation funds.

By 2004, NKCDC had reclaimed over 600 of the vacant parcels, stabilizing them, planting trees and

selling 200 to homeowners as side yards. Consolidating lots into larger parcels, NKCDC also created a

community garden center on a high-profile site on Frankford Avenue, the neighborhood’s main street,

and worked with Greensgrow Farms, a community agriculture organization, to create a three-quarter

acre urban farm on the site of an abandoned galvanized steel plant, which today supplies fresh produce

to many of Philadelphia’s most exclusive restaurants.

After 10 years, the CDC’s efforts have had a dramatic effect on the community. “The program has made

a tremendous physical impact,” says NKCDC executive director Sandy Salzman. “With the increasing

amount of clean and green spaces – replacing what were once trashed vacant lots – people no longer

feel threatened by their surroundings.” A recent study by the Wharton School at the University of

Pennsylvania found that while being next to a vacant lot reduces property values, being next to a lot

that NKCDC had cleaned, landscaped and stabilized led to a long-term increase of 30 percent compared

to other properties in the area. Now, after decades of being neglected, Kensington and Fishtown are

being “discovered.”

Abandoned Houses

Operation ReachOut SouthWest wasn’t the only Baltimore organization that saw vacant properties as

both problem and solution. In 1995, a new CDC had just been set up across town in Patterson Park, a

badly disinvested neighborhood ravaged by crime and drugs. Fewer and fewer homeowners were

interested in buying in the area, and properties were being rented out or bought by slumlords who

would milk the property for a few years and then walk away. Homeownership rates were dropping, and

in parts of the neighborhood one out of four homes stood vacant and abandoned. In the heart of the

neighborhood, the once-magnificent 19th century Patterson Park had so deteriorated that many of the

neighborhood’s residents never entered it.

Patterson Park CDC (PPCDC) set out to gain control of the vacant houses in the neighborhood,

rehabilitate them to a high standard, sell some and rent others. Most houses were sold at market rates,

while rental units were offered at below-market levels, reflecting the CDC’s goal of creating an

economically and socially diverse community of choice. By 2002, PPCDC had already rehabbed 261

homes, of which they had sold 120 and rented out 141. By that year, PPCDC was selling its houses for

nearly $120,000, or almost three times the $45,000 they commanded in 1997. By the spring of 2006, the

CDC was listing one of its houses for $399,000. PPCDC was also a key player in the restoration of the

park, which has since become a major neighborhood asset.

Vacant, abandoned properties have also been the focus of HANDS’ efforts, in Orange, New Jersey. By

the 1980s Orange, an older working-class suburb of Newark, was in bad shape. Property values were

down, crime was up and abandoned properties were commonplace, destabilizing many blocks. With

nearly 300 abandoned houses scattered around this small city of little more than two square miles, few

neighborhoods were immune to their destructive effect.

HANDS had begun building and rehabilitating scattered affordable housing for first-time homebuyers in

1985, but after 10 years they realized that something critical was missing. In 1996, they adopted a new

approach focusing directly on the city’s abandoned houses; in Morrissy’s words, to “take the biggest

eyesore on a block where…the neighbors don’t even want to walk past…take it, get control of it…and

transform it into a house that sends a positive message about what’s going on in the neighborhood.”

HANDS prepared an inventory of Orange’s problem properties and systematically set out to gain control

of them, tracking down property owners and lienholders across the United States, buying tax liens and

foreclosing, clearing title. Using a mixture of public and private funds, HANDS rehabilitated the

properties, sold them to first-time homebuyers and put them back on the tax rolls.

The results have been dramatic. By 2005, the number of abandoned houses in Orange had dropped to

barely 70 properties, of which Morrissy says, “only a dozen of these are real hard core.” Meanwhile,

between 2000 and 2004, the average sales price in Orange increased by 50 percent, from $118,000 to

$178,000. HANDS, in fact, has begun to shift gears, taking on a comprehensive revitalization strategy for

the city’s Valley neighborhood, which will include a large-scale mixed-use redevelopment of a cluster of

former hat factories in partnership with two for-profit developers.

Neither Patterson Park CDC nor HANDS limited themselves to city-owned properties, or waited for

properties to be offered them, either by the city or by private owners. Perhaps the most critical single

element in the success of their efforts was that both CDCs made the same entrepreneurial decision: to

move aggressively to acquire properties, using whatever financial resources, legal and negotiating tools

that were available. Both organizations took risks, taking control of properties that they might not be

able to use immediately, and banking properties for future reuse. While they partnered with city

government, they did not allow the city to dictate either the scope or the pace of their efforts. They

recognized a fundamental reality – without control of properties, one cannot control the future of the

community.

Lessons for CDCs

The experience of the four CDCs described here, along with others around the country, demonstrates

clearly that a strategy that prioritizes vacant properties – either vacant lots or abandoned houses – can

be an effective means of bringing neighborhoods back, restoring residents’ faith in their community and

turning around long-term decline in property values. Besides the importance of gaining control of

properties, other key lessons include:

Vacant properties must be a priority. While no CDC is likely to focus exclusively on vacant properties, a

vacant property strategy demands that it be a priority for the organization; that it be a steady, ongoing

effort; and that tracking the status of vacant properties in the neighborhood be a constant, rather than

intermittent, task.

Scale is critical. The nature of abandoned properties is that every one is a problem, and that scattered,

haphazard efforts are not valuable. NKCDC may not have cleaned up every one of the 1,100 vacant lots

in the neighborhood, but they transformed over 600 of them. Patterson Park CDC reclaimed nearly 300

houses in less than eight years. While a long-term strategy is critical, without the ability to go to scale –

and do so relatively quickly – a CDC will not be able to get ahead of the problem and generate

productive long-term results.

A long-term commitment is needed. Even once the CDC is operating at scale, dealing with vacant

properties can be a slow process, especially, as in Orange, where the heart of the strategy called for

getting control of buildings from irresponsible private owners. The effects of the strategy are also

gradual, and only visible after years of effort. HANDS, Patterson Park and New Kensington have all been

pursuing their vacant property strategies for 10 or more years.

Vacant property strategies require specialized expertise. The expertise required will vary depending on

the type of properties and the strategy being pursued. HANDS needed to recruit expertise in arcane

areas of property law such as tax foreclosure, while Bon Secours needed both legal and design expertise

for its Southwest Baltimore strategy. Without the guidance of the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society,

NKCDC would have had a far harder time putting together its vacant land management program.

The strategy must be tied to other community building efforts. None of these CDCs does only vacant

properties. The open space program in Southwest Baltimore is part of a comprehensive revitalization

strategy incorporating many different programs and activities. NKCDC and HANDS run homebuyer

counseling and assistance programs, and Patterson Park CDC’s activities include organizing park

programs and providing services to new immigrants. All of these efforts are coordinated with the vacant

property strategy; HANDS and PPCDC use their homebuyer counseling programs to funnel buyers into

the vacant houses they restore, while OROSW and NKCDC both use their open space or vacant lot

programs as ways to build resident engagement and community cohesion.

The most important lesson, however, is that abandoned property strategies work. Far more than many

alternative CDC activities, including affordable housing construction, such strategies go directly to the

heart of why the housing market in an area is not functioning effectively, and why the neighborhood’s

problems seem so intractable. They are not easy, and not for the faint-hearted, but abandoned property

strategies have the potential to be transformative strategies for the revitalization of distressed inner-city

neighborhoods.

Copyright 2006

Alan Mallach is research director for the National Housing Institute. His latest book is Bringing Buildings

Back: From Abandoned Properties to Community Assets.

Anticipating Change

Just as vacant, abandoned properties act as a drag on property values, an effective strategy that

eliminates them or – as in Southwest Baltimore or Kensington – neutralizes their negative effects, can

become a spur to increase property values. Where the location of the neighborhood is conducive to

higher property values, the increase can be dramatic. Both Patterson Park and Kensington are located

relatively close to areas that had begun to gentrify in the 1990s, while Orange is located in the heart of

the New York metropolitan area, with commuter rail access to Newark and New York City.

These neighborhoods have changed dramatically in the past few years. Where vacant houses might once

sit abandoned in Orange neighborhoods for years or decades, today – except for a handful with

intractable legal or title problems – investors and speculators move quickly to snap up vacant

properties, fixing them up and reselling or renting them out. In Patterson Park, houses that might not

have found a buyer at any price 10 years ago are selling for more than $300,000.

This is both good and bad. A stronger market can mean a healthier neighborhood, where economically

diverse homebuyers choose to buy and where upwardly mobile families choose to stay. At the same

time it creates increasing pressure on the area’s lower-income families and individuals who previously

found the neighborhood an affordable place to live. CDCs should anticipate that, over time, a rising

market may force many of those families out of their community, through higher property taxes on

homeowners, rent increases or displacement, as existing buildings are converted to homeownership or

demolished for more profitable uses. Markets are powerful forces and can easily preempt the CDC’s

goal of building an economically diverse community. Once they take hold, there may be little a CDC can

do to preserve affordability and maintain diversity.

A CDC in an impoverished, struggling neighborhood pockmarked by vacant lots and abandoned houses

may find it difficult even to imagine the possibility that, within a few years, demand might increase to

the point where competition for the neighborhood’s houses may become a problem. Yet that is

precisely what is required. Each organization contemplating a vacant property strategy – or indeed any

comprehensive revitalization effort – must ask itself how it will deal with market pressures, if and when

those pressures arise. Only by anticipating change, and building strategies to hold onto affordable

housing, can a CDC create the conditions in which an economically diverse population is a sustainable

reality for a neighborhood, rather than a transitional state between an impoverished neighborhood and

an affluent one.

– A.M.

Research Notes

• Bringing Buildings Back, the first comprehensive guide to abandoned property, is now available. It

contains a wealth of good practices, like those described in this issue’s Research Update, and provides

strategies for prevention, management and the reuse of such property.

• Shared Equity Homeownership: The Changing Landscape of Resale-Restricted, Owner-Occupied

Housing will be available on nhi.org later in 2006. This report examines the role of third-sector housing –

inclusionary units, limited-equity coops and community land trusts – in providing an affordable form of

homeownership for millions of Americans whose incomes are between 30 percent and 120 percent of

local area median income.

Cedars Neighborhood 2011 Crime Survey

As part of the new crime / quality of life committee, we are exploring block captain scenarios. Please review neighborhood regions map to selection your region.

Region 1 21%Region 2 16%Region 3 5%Region 4 9%Region 5 32%Region 6 2%Region 7 0%Region 8 2%Region 9 13%

Burglary (Residential/Business) 31 57%Theft (BMV) 36 67%Auto Theft 13 24%Disturbance (Disorderly Conduct, Loud Music) 35 65%Drugs/Drug Location 39 72%Loitering 46 85%Vacant houses (Code Violation/Squatters) 29 54%Speeding 15 28%Gunfire (Shooting) 8 15%Gambling 3 6%Criminal Mischief 19 35%Motel (Criminal Activity) 9 17%Prostitution (male) 18 33%Prostitution (female) 18 33%None 0 0%Other 8 15%People may select more than one checkbox, so percentages may add up to more than 100%.

Please check the space that best describes the type of crime(s) concerns occuring in your community.

Burglary (Residential/Business) 31 57%Theft (BMV) 36 67%Auto Theft 13 24%Disturbance (Disorderly Conduct, Loud Music) 35 65%Drugs/Drug Location 39 72%Loitering 46 85%Vacant houses (Code Violation/Squatters) 29 54%Speeding 15 28%Gunfire (Shooting) 8 15%Gambling 3 6%Criminal Mischief 19 35%Motel (Criminal Activity) 9 17%Prostitution (male) 18 33%Prostitution (female) 18 33%None 0 0%Other 8 15%People may select more than one checkbox, so percentages may add up to more than 100%.

Yes 18 32%No 32 57%

Do you feel you have adequate police patrol in your area?

Yes 48 86%No 7 13%

Is there a good relation be-tween your community and Police Department?

Yes 24 43%No 31 55%

Do you know the Neighbor-hood Police Office (NPO) for your area?

Yes 40 71%No 16 29%

Do you belong to a Crime Watch Group or Neighbor-hood Association?

Yes 32 57%No 24 43%

Do you have a contact person within the Dallas Police De-partment?

None 8 14%1-3 month 29 52%4-6 month 5 9%7-9 month 5 9%Over a year 2 4%Other 7 13%

When was the last time you spoke or met with an officer?

What type of contact did you have with police if any? (Check as man as apply)

None 8 15%Reporting a neighborhood disturbance 24 45%Victim of crime (example; burglary, theft, assault) 8 15%Witness a crime 10 19%Trafic Violation 2 4%Other 22 42%

Please describe your contact with police in your neighbrohood if any?

None 3 5%Good 15 27%Satisfactory 27 48%Poor 8 14%

Please rate the police response time in your communit

Apartment 3 5%House 8 14%Business 4 7%Townhome 15 27%Condo 15 27%Other 11 20%

None 4 7%Courteous 47 84%Rude 1 2%Indifferent 4 7%

Age Group17-19 0 0%20-29 4 7%30-49 31 55%50-64 20 36%65+ 1 2%Other 0 0%

Male 35 63%Female 21 38%

Single 23 41%Married 27 48%Children 0 0%Other 6 11%

Single 23 41%Married 27 48%Children 0 0%Other 6 11%

Juvenile Issues

Truancy 5 11%Gang Activity 9 19%Curfew Violations 6 13%Graffiti 34 72%None 9 19%Other 6 13%People may select more than one checkbox, so percentages may add up to more than 100%.

Please rank additional neigh-borhood concerns

Litter 45 92%Code violations 34 69%Encampments 37 76%18-wheeler / Truck traffic (i.e. parking on empty lots) 28 57%Other 8 16%People may select more than one checkbox, so percentages may add up to more than 100%.

CHAPTER 33 STYROFOAM ORDINANCE

Whereas, the Council finds that:

1. Located in Maine on the shore of the North Atlantic Ocean, an

area known world-wide for its natural beauty, fish and other

wildlife, the Town of Freeport believes that it has an obligation

to maintain and preserve its special natural environment;

2. Maintenance of Freeport as litter-free as possible is important

to protect and preserve its natural environment and enhance its

quality of life for residents and visitors;

3. The United Nations Environmental Programme Diplomatic Conference

in Montreal (Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the

Ozone Layer) acknowledged the threat of chlorofluorocarbons to

the earth's atmosphere and established international goals for

the phased reduction of the manufacture and use of specific

chlorofluorocarbon compounds ("CFC's"). The Town of Freeport

supports international and federal efforts to reduce the

non-essential use of chlorofluorocarbons.;

4. The Federal Environmental Protection Agency reports that foam

products account for 28% of ozone-depleting potential of CFC's.

Blowing agents used in the production of non-CFC PSF's create

hazardous earth-level smog;

5. The Federal Environmental Protection Agency has issued a national

municipal waste strategy calling for a 25 percent reduction in

solid waste by 1992. The strategy, titled "The Solid Waste

Dilemma: An Agenda for Action", includes the promotion of

recycling. The State of Maine is considering how to implement

this strategy;

6. The State of Maine has banned the service of food and beverages

in polystyrene foam containers at facilities or functions of the

State or its political subdivisions effective January 1, 1990

(38 MRSA Section 1651 et seq.);

7. Readily disposable consumer plastic containers and wrappers

(including those made from polystyrene foam) are essentially not

biodegradable and as litter do not decompose over time into the

natural environment;

8. The use of readily disposable consumer plastic containers and

wrappers has increased annually and projections indicate a

significant growth in their use;

9. Plastic litter, particularly polystyrene foam, poses a threat to

the natural environment, including fish and other wildlife;

-1-

10. This Ordinance will serve the public interest by reducing the

amount of non-biodegradable waste littering Freeport as a portion

of any substitute packaging is expected to be composed of

biodegradable material in whole or in part. Polystyrene foam

litter is highly durable, buoyant, and non-biodegradable and,

therefore, persists and detracts from the appearance of the area

longer than many other types of litter;

11. At the present time there is no Recycling Program in Freeport for

polystyrene foam food or beverage containers;

12. Some other commonly used food packaging materials are also

non-biodegradable and contribute to litter problems;

nevertheless, the Council finds that it is appropriate to

regulate polystyrene foam food packaging while not regulating

other types of food packaging at this time for the following

reasons:

A. To minimize disruption in the food services and sales

industry, the Council should avoid banning a wide range of

packaging materials at one time. It might be appropriate to

ban other packaging materials in the future, but an

incremental approach to eliminating undesirable packaging

materials will cause less disruption and allow the Town to

handle enforcement in more manageable stages;

B. Polystyrene foam is the most commonly used non-reuseable

food packaging material for prepared foods in restaurants

and food service establishments in Freeport and, therefore,

prohibiting its use for such purpose and its sale at retail

will be the most effective way of reducing non-biodegradable

litter in Freeport;

C. Ingestion of polystyrene foam particles has been identified

as a hazard to wildlife, while this problem has not been

associated with other food packaging materials.

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT ORDERED:

1. On and after January 1, 1990, no retail food vendor shall serve

or sell prepared food and no food packager shall package meat,

eggs, bakery products or other food in polystyrene foam (PSF)

containers;

2. On and after January 1, 1990, no vendor in the Town of Freeport

who sells tangible personal property at retail shall sell

polystyrene foam food or beverage containers;

3. Violations of this Ordinance shall be punishable by fines as

follows:

A. A fine not exceeding $250 for the first violation in a

one-year period;

B. A fine not exceeding $500 for the second and each subsequent

violation in a one-year period;