DANVILLE – In the last 10 years, the city has spent more than $3 million tearing down hundreds of dilapidated residential and commercial buildings.

Most were vacant and neglected by their property owners, and the burden of paying to demolish eventually fell to the city and its taxpayers.

Tired of the blight, other problems associated with vacant buildings and spending limited resources on demolitions, city officials decided to take a more proactive approach to the problem.

In January 2009, aldermen overwhelmingly approved a vacant-building ordinance that requires owners of vacant residential and commercial structures to register those properties annually with the city and have a plan for rehabilitation or demolition if they are not actively being marketed for sale, lease or rent.

"The city won't simply allow properties to remain vacant to the point of dilapidation where we then have to come in and demolish the structure at taxpayer cost," Mayor Scott Eisenhauer said.

It's given the city a much better perspective on which structures are actually vacant versus ones that appear to be vacant, he said, and what plans property owners have for the future of those structures.

"It has given us the ability to gain entrance into some of those properties, so we can determine if additional health and safety code violations exist, and it has also allowed us to take a more proactive approach to external code enforcement violations," he said.

Here's how it works:

– A vacant commercial or residential building must be registered with the city annually if it is not actively being marketed for sale, lease or rent. There's a $50 registration fee for residential and $100 fee for commercial buildings.

– If it's not being marketed, the owner must submit plans for rehabilitation or demolition.

– In a year, if nothing has changed, and the owner cannot demonstrate any progress toward rehab or demolition, the city fines the owner $500. Annual fines continue if nothing changes.

This fall, city inspectors identified 262 residential and commercial properties that met the city's definition of vacant and 70 percent to 75 percent had code violations, according to Jim Meharry, city inspection and enforcement manager. Letters were sent in December to the property owners telling them to register their structures.

So far, of those 262, 17 commercial and 57 residential properties have been registered.

Of those, three commercial properties had been registered last year and nothing had changed, so they owe $500. And six residential properties had registered last year, have made no progress and now owe $500.

Members of the local landlord association have spoken out against the ordinance at council meetings, telling aldermen there are valid reasons for a building to be vacant, and the ordinance penalizes good property owners who may need more than a year to rehabilitate a building or residence.

The mayor and John Heckler, public development director with the city, said the ordinance is not about generating revenue or targeting responsible property owners.

Heckler said there's a difference between unoccupied and vacant. If a building is vacant but properly secured and maintained without external code violations, then it's not a structure the city will pursue.

"The property owners that neglect their property and it causes a nuisance to neighbors, we will go after those property owners," Heckler said. "We really want people to either demolish the (building) or have a plan for it. We don't want to keep charging people to charge them. We want them to do something. Our intent wasn't to send out bills every year."

And although Heckler calls the ordinance a work in progress, he said the $500 fine really has gotten the attention of some, but the city has struggled to track down all the property owners.

In some cases, Heckler said, owners are deceased and have no heirs. Or some properties are in foreclosure, and in some cases, the owners simply can't be found, because addresses on public records are no longer valid.

"I can't say we've seen great change, but I don't think it's a program that you can measure in one or two years. It's more long-term," Heckler said. "We're glad we did this, but it's a work in progress ... but we have noticed people are paying attention, and we have had more interaction with them about their property."

Meharry called it a work in progress as well, but said sitting back and doing nothing wasn't getting anything accomplished for anybody either.

"At least now there's an ordinance in place," he said. "I feel like it's a very positive move."