From Edward Broussard, City Manager:
Missouri City residents have long been proud of their community’s appearance and beauty. We understand that by maintaining and improving our yards and homes, we create a sense of pride in our city. We demonstrate how much we care for keeping Missouri City a premier place for families to live through our property maintenance and neighborhood improvements. Missouri City is our home and we take pride in this.
To promote this sense of pride in our community that starts in our neighborhoods, the City has dedicated itself to building on its code enforcement program. Our code enforcement staff take a pro-active stance on eliminating code violations throughout the city, from overgrown weeds and grass to needed roof repairs. During the past year, our code enforcement division has processed over 20,500 actions on code violations. Some of these were complaint-based, while others were observed or discovered by the code enforcement officers as they conduct their patrols of the community.
And while we are proud of the continual progress by our staff in keeping Missouri City beautiful, we strive to do better. We look to improve our legal processing times to hasten the restoration or removal of fire-damaged homes. We are expediting the mowing of high grass and weeds. We are diligently searching for contact with owners of foreclosed homes to require the maintenance of the property. We have gained access to vehicle ownership information to speed the removal of junk vehicles. A database is being assembled to help focus enforcement efforts in areas most threatened.
We are also now providing warnings to first-time violators of our restrictions on having trash cans out at the curb or where it can be seen from the street if it’s not trash pick-up day. Previously, code enforcement staff gave a ticket to anyone in violation. We understand that there are those who come in violation for the first-time of this ordinance may be new residents or have grass clippings left at the curb by their yard maintenance service. This slight change allows for code enforcement staff to work with residents to correct the issue on the first violation without the fines and time of going to municipal court.
Our objective is to maintain the appearance of the community through education and enforcement. We appreciate the strong support that Missouri City gives to our code enforcement program and the sense of neighborhood integrity that thrives throughout the city. Together, we’re keeping Missouri City a place that we’re proud to call home.
If you wish to contact us, call the Code Enforcement Hotline at 281.403.8560 or email code@missouricitytx.gov.