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[Rochelle Small-Toney, Deputy City Manager for the City of Fayetteville] "Ramp , of course
is our rental action management program and the purpose of our visit on Monday was to
sit with Representative Brawley and other municipal officials to talk about his proposed
amendments and the effect those amendments would have on programs such as the one we
have here in Fayetteville. We were very fortunate to have Ms. Stella Mullen join us. Stella
is the president of the Massey Hill Community Watch Program and she was able to share very
candid examples of what that community went through."
[Stella Mullen, President of the Massey Hill Community Watch] "We are an older community,
we had a lot of crime and blight and we were one of the first candidates for a program
the city had... they called it "Clean Sweep". We were excellent candidates for that, the
city came in with code enforcement, inspections, police and really helped us clean up the area
of Massey Hill. That was the boost we needed to revitalize on our first steps to revitalize
Massey Hill. It is much better but we still have a long battle to go. We deal with property
owners who are not responsible a lot of times. We have a lot of rentals. We are like, 90%
rentals in Massey Hill, so that is a constant battle. We have some good property managers,
but then we have some that are not so great. We have a lot of property owners that might
not ask for a background check, do not take care of their properties so the property becomes
an eyesore. It is constantly being rented to people in the criminal element that makes
it really tough on the community. So, it really brings down the whole community and we can't
get nice quality people that want to stay in Massey Hill because they are afraid."
[Rochelle Small-Toney, Deputy City Manager for the City of Fayetteville] "We do have
the majority of our landowners who are responsible. Unfortunately laws are written to legislate
the actions or inactions of a very small number of people. That is the case here. We are not
talking about large numbers of landowners or property owners who are not responsible
for their tenancy or the condition of their property. The RAMP program, however, has certain
elements in it that will encourage those individuals who own property, who may be renting property
who exhibit certain criminal behaviors that they may not be aware of. But none the less,
working code enforcement and law enforcement, once the conditions are brought to their attention,
they are given the opportunity to abate the nuisance or to move that particular tenant
along."
[Stella Mullen, President of the Massey Hill Community Watch] "The RAMP program, I know,
has helped Massey Hill but all of Fayetteville. We really fought hard for the RAMP program.
We needed that extra boost, extra help with a program that would help us property owners
that maybe do not want to have that communication with us. This kind of forces them, opens up
the door for communication with the property owner. It gives them a lot of good education.
We have seen really good, really great results from the RAMP program. It has helped us tremendously
by opening up that communication with the property owners, they realize there is a problem,
they work to correct it. It is our goal, as I know it is the City of Fayetteville, never
to have anybody actually go into the RAMP program."
[Rochelle Small-Toney, Deputy City Manager for the City of Fayetteville] "When the program
was designed, it was that at this particular time there would be about 85 properties registered
in this program. At this time, the good news is that there are only 7. So, the program
is quite effective, once the property owner is notified of the conditions, they are given
a certain period of time to correct it or face a very healthy penalty or fine. So, in
this case, the fine or the penalty has proven to be a deterrent and working cooperatively
with the police department and code enforcement and the property owner, many of those conditions
have been abated."
[Stella Mullen, President of the Massey Hill Community Watch] "If the RAMP program is ended,
it is going to be devastating to our community. We are going to fall right back to a very
bad situation where have areas that are blighted, that are filled with crime, unsafe... it is
putting every law-abiding resident in jeopardy in our community, and all over Fayetteville."
[Rochelle Small-Toney, Deputy City Manager for the City of Fayetteville] "We will continue
our push quite aggressively to work through our local delegation, through city council,
working with the representative to render a piece of legislation that we can all live
with. But as it is currently proposed, it will us quite ineffective and quite honestly,
it will just kill what we already have."