OLD DOCUMENTS RAISE NEW QUESTIONS ABOUT MALL DEMISE

After the September 8, 2006, Daily Times article in which Salisbury city officials lambasted the successful petitioners who appealed the illegal rezoning of the old Salisbury Mall by the City of Salisbury, a Public Information Act request has yielded documents from city department heads showing that the run-down property was condemned long before an appeal was filed.

In the article, Mayor Barrie Tilghman was quoted as saying, “The old mall would be torn down if it were not for this challenge. Every day a citizen drives by that mall they need to thank the people who ... went through a procedural avenue to stall and, I believe, to stop the development.”

Further negative comments were made about the four petitioners by Councilwoman Shanie Shields and City Council President Mike Dunn. Dunn also noted that city-ordered demolition of the old mall was slated to happen by January 5, 2007.

The announcement of a demolition deadline triggered the Public Information Act request for documents that could provide background about it. Documents were covered by a letter from City Attorney Paul Wilber dated September 21, 2006, citing that the enclosed documents “constitute a partial answer” to the request.

The documents show that the city condemned the old Salisbury Mall property on July 5, 2005, long before the appeal was filed.

Key among the documents shared was a letter from Tom Stevenson, director of Neighborhood Services and Code Compliance, written to the mall owners on July 7, 2006. In the letter, Stevenson stated, “Considering the referenced property has been condemned since July 5, 2005 (Case #05-3214) I feel you have been given more than enough time to raze the structure or bring it into compliance. I realize you have a considerable proposal on the table regarding the renovation of the land; however, this does not exclude your responsibility as a property owner within these corporate limits.”

Stevenson’s letter, which came a year after the property was condemned, noted that the mall property had been cited for code violations by the Building, Housing and Zoning department over 30 times in the previous two years alone.

The letter then stipulated a deadline of January 5, 2007, thus giving the mall owners another 6 months to comply with demolishing the old mall. Since the original condemnation order was not included with the document package, it is not known whether a deadline was stipulated in it as well. Another Public Information Act request has been filed to obtain the rest of the documentation concerning the old mall’s condemnation history.

Stevenson’s letter seemed prompted by an April 10, 2006, memo from Fire Chief David See urging the city to require the mall’s owners to secure the property from entry. See referred to “the dilapidated and deteriorating structure” as “a major concern for our department due to its threat to public safety.” His memo noted that the fire department had responded to “numerous nuisance alarms” and “extinguished a working fire within this structure.”

See’s memo was backed by another the same day from Chief Fire Protection Specialist Ed Torbert who stated the building presented a “huge risk to the firefighters” who would be compelled to “perform a search and rescue operation” given the “possibility of having a significant number of homeless people in the building.” On April 12, 2006, Torbert’s memo was forward to Tom Stevenson, who had recently become the head of the new Neighborhood Services and Code Compliance department.

The petitioners applauded the efforts of the three department heads, noting that their documents demonstrated great concern for citizens, public safety and firefighters well-being.

Petitioner Terry Cohen said, “These documents prove that the mayor’s accusations about us were unfounded. Our appeal had nothing to do with the old mall not having been torn down yet. More importantly, these documents underscore a serious lack of transparency with our city government and raise a host of important questions, such as whether or not fines were collected for all those violations.”

Kate Manizade, another petitioner, wondered, “Why did the city administration choose to wait so long to condemn the property and require demolition, as well as to withhold this information from the public? What other property is allowed to remain standing so long after so many violations and how many violations were there before it was condemned?”

A third petitioner, David Suiter, commented, “We need to get everything out on the table here. Our goal is to see something of real value built on this property, such as a true community, not just a dense development of structures. We need honesty and openness to move forward.”

The petitioners intend to discuss their research and recommendations for improvements to the old mall plan later this week. In an effort to move forward on the project, they submitted a proposal for discussion to the city Planning and Zoning department with copies to the city council.