Enforcement Discretion
All code violations may not meet a degree of significance to warrant continued staff time and the expenditure of further County funds. For instance, if a property has 1 (one) Derelict Vehicle, it is unlikely anyone would find the violation warrants the same degree of staff time as a property with 10 (ten) Derelict Vehicles - anyone, that is, except the complaining citizen. In these instances, the Code Compliance Officer (CCO) has the ability to determine that although a technical violation exists, the violation does not meet a standard of significance to warrant further expenditure of staff time and County resources.
Substantial Compliance
The standard of "substantial compliance" is critical for managing scarce County resources. Substantial compliance allows the County to close those cases that fundamentally satisfy County requirements. For example, where a property owner brings the property into compliance by mitigating the most serious and significant violations, but still has an outstanding minor violation, like the example above of a fence one inch above height limitations, the CCO will bring this to the owner's attention with a notice listing those items that have been corrected and minor items which the owner should correct, but which staff will not actively pursue (unless, of course, the minor violations become more serious at a later date).