Blitz on vacant property

Enforcement action is to be taken against owners of more than 1,000 vacant buildings a year in a drive to improve the look of the city.

Liverpool has about 19,000 empty properties, about nine percent of its total stock, compared with a national average of three percent.

Currently the city council is able to deal with about 400 a year, either by bringing them back into use or demolition, but is taking action to almost double that number next year and to more than 1,100 a year from 2008/9.
It has recently doubled the size of its Vacant Initiative team from two to four and taken on extra staff to deal with vacant premises under the Look of the City initiative.

It is intended to take on additional staff to target gateway routes into the city, deal with long term vacant property and to take forward the ‘Look of the City’ project including dealing with the top 100 ‘grot spots’ in the city.
The team has successfully tackled properties which are blighting their neighbourhood by using Section 215 of the Town and Country Planning Act, which enables the City Council to tackle blight and amenity issues. From April 1 to date a total of 124 of these notices have been served, all requiring extensive work to be carried out in vacant properties and on vacant land.

A further 190 notices using other powers have also been served on vacant premises to tackle building and drainage defects, statutory nuisance and rodent infestation.

Some of the noticeable achievements of the team include the demolition of the King Edward pub at the junction of Leeds Street and Great Howard Street which had been vacant for many years and had fallen into a state of severe disrepair and suffered some fire damage. The disused property was attracting drug addicts who were squatting in the building.The ongoing refurbishment of 24 properties in Westminster Road through the use of enforcement action was another major success of the team as well as the demolition of the Crown pub. A large building at the junction of Stopgate Lane and East Lancashire Road which had suffered extensive fire damage and attracted a high level of anti-social behaviour.

Councillor Mike Storey, Executive Member for Regeneration, said: “We have made great strides in dealing with vacant and derelict property through the Look of the City and other initiatives but we need to step up our campaign to
have an even greater impact.

“We are absolutely determined to do more to remove the blight of vacant and dilapidated properties and ensure that the owners of these properties are made to face up to their responsibilities.

“The properties we will be targeting not only blight neighbourhoods but deter investment in the city.
“We are determined to improve the way the city looks not just for the Capital of Culture year but for many years beyond and bring back empty properties back into productive use or, where that is not possible, demolishing them and removing eyesores.”