Less than two weeks after Bristol’s effort to take over the blighted former Virginia Intermont College site was stymied by the surprise payment of the owner’s property tax bill, city council on Tuesday will consider a change to an ordinance dealing with blighted properties.
The change would require that city council, rather than City Manager Randy Eads and the building official, have the authority to require the removal or repair of buildings that endanger the public’s health or safety. If the owner doesn’t comply, the city can do the work and charge the owner, which is a lien on the property.
Currently, U.S. Magis International owes the city $18,387 for work the city has done at the site, including the demolition of the walls of the original buildings on campus, which burned in a December blaze.
That money is due Wednesday. Eads said earlier that if it isn’t paid, he will file another complaint for the city to take over the property so it can be sold to a developer who will do something with it.
Eads said the city is making a “concerted effort” to address all the blighted and derelict property in the city and the ordinance will apply to all blighted properties.
But he also said that the former Virginia Intermont College property is currently the city’s biggest blighted building challenge.
The 130-year-old college in downtown Bristol closed in 2014, and it has been vacant and deteriorating ever since. In 2016, it was purchased by Magis, which is based in China. The company announced plans to locate a business college on the property. Those plans never materialized.
In the years since its purchase, the buildings have fallen into serious disrepair, becoming a target of vandals and a haven for the homeless.
The city has tried unsuccessfully a number of times to get the owner to clean up and secure the property.
During the last session of the Virginia General Assembly, Eads was successful in his bid to get legislation passed that would allow the city to petition the circuit court to take control of the property and sell it without having to auction it off to the highest bidder. The new law took effect July 1.
The city filed the request with the court on July 10, and the following day, Magis paid $605,000 in back taxes it owed, so the city essentially withdrew the request. Eads and Mayor Becky Nave said they were surprised by the payment because the owner had said many times he was going to pay them and never followed through.
Eads sent Magis a letter last week detailing all that needs to be corrected at the property and gave the company 30 days to respond with a plan describing how the problems will be addressed. If that doesn’t happen, he said he will ask city council to declare the property blighted.
Meanwhile, Police Chief Byron Ashbrook is looking into the possibility of whether the VI property could be considered criminally blighted, according to Eads, who said there have been more than 500 police calls to the property over about the last five years.
“He’s got to do some research on the previous calls that we’ve had up there to determine if it meets the criminal blight definition,” spelled out in the Virginia Code, Eads said.
Criminal blight is when property poses a danger to the public health or safety of residents because of the regular presence of people who are under the influence of controlled substances; the property is used for illegally possessing, manufacturing or distributing controlled substances; the property is regularly used for commercial sex acts; and the discharge of a firearm that would constitute a criminal act, the code states.
Council meets at 6 p.m. Tuesday at City Hall, 300 Lee St. Here’s the agenda.
