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Home My WebLink About05(K) - Accept the 2025 Year-End Code Enforcement Report Report ITEM: 5K CITY COUNCIL AGENDA REPORT MEETING DATE: April 28, 2026 PREPARED BY: Dale Stefanisko, Code Enforcement Officer PRESENTED BY: Dale Stefanisko AGENDA ITEM: Accept the 2025 Year-End Code Enforcement Report RECOMMENDED ACTION: Motion and second accepting the 2025 year-end Code Enforcement Report. BACKGROUND: In July of 2007, the City of Prior Lake hired its first full-time Code Enforcement Officer. The primary goal of the code enforcement program is to enhance the health, safety, and aesthetics of the city through voluntary compliance. We continue to maximize the attractiveness of residential and commercial properties by effectively enforcing the standards and requirements of the City Code, which have been achieved by both a proactive and complaint driven code enforcement approach. Code enforcement efforts have and continue to lead to meliorative actions in the community. A resident can contact the Code Enforcement Officer with questions or concerns, and a site visit will be made. If a violation is confirmed at the time of inspection, the responsible party will be notified. The property owner and/or tenant will be provided with a notice of the violation/s and given a deadline to make the needed corrective actions. When voluntary compliance is not achieved within a reasonable amount of time, it may become necessary to issue a misdemeanor citation to the responsible party. A citation requires the responsible party to appear at Scott County District Court. This typically results in a fine and confirmation that the violation has been corrected. If compliance still is not achieved, it may become necessary to proceed in civil court to obtain compliance. City Code compliance can also be achieved through educating and informing the public of the city ordinances. Examples of public outreach include the creation of handouts and flyers for specific codes. The City monument signs are also used to display various types of seasonal code enforcement information. The City’s website lists several types of common code violations, links to the Code Enforcement Policy and the Good Neighbor Guide to Code Compliance. Voluntary compliance is the desired goal of the Code Enforcement Program and is achieved in the vast majority of code enforcement cases. All Code Enforcement related activities are tracked in the BS&A software program. The Code Enforcement Officer documents the findings of the initial inspection and any subsequent inspections until the case is closed. This documentation includes inspection findings, photos, notices, correspondence, and any other updates or developments pertaining to a case. All the case information is contained in one database and is easily searchable. The BS&A software platform not only allows for administration of the Code Enforcement Program, but allows for better case management, improved and additional reporting and automatic letter generation. Current Circumstances This report consists of a year-end summary of the total number of cases closed in 2025; new cases opened in 2025; total of all violations on closed cases; source of the complaints; the City of Prior Lake | 4646 Dakota Street SE | Prior Lake MN 55372 Item 5K Page | 2 processes used to resolve the violations; the average time frame required to resolve a complaint; the total amount of inspections; the voluntary compliance percentage; repeat violator properties for this reporting period; the case amounts of rental properties; amount of extensions granted; a breakdown of the twelve most common violation categories; any City fees collected as a result of code enforcement actions; and comparisons of prior year’s code violations. This report is furnished to provide the Council with insight that may be useful in evaluating current resident concerns and future regulatory decisions. It has been observed that most City residents have pride in their neighborhoods and the community. Residents feel an obligation to maintain a neat appearance on their properties and expect neighboring properties and properties throughout Prior Lake to do the same. The City of Prior Lake has documented five hundred and fifty-one (551) new code enforcement cases opened in 2025. There were five hundred forty-eight (548) cases that closed in 2025. The information on violation totals is based on cases closed in the year 2025. Some cases have more than one violation documented. There were 1,122 violations addressed in 2025 for a decrease of 12.2% when compared to the 1,278 violations addressed in 2024. Violations were as follows: Public Nuisance 202 Tall Grass 168 Property Maintenance 157 Junk Vehicles 142 Permit Violation 129 Vehicles Parked in the Yard 91 Junk Storage 82 Right of Way 41 Garbage & Refuse 39 Signage 32 Zoning Use 23 Animal Control 16 The attached Exhibit A displays the type of violations for the closed cases for the current reporting period. The attached Exhibit B displays a year-to-year comparison of complaints from the past three years. The attached Exhibit C displays the code enforcement violations and total closed cases, compared over the last ten years. The attached Exhibit D displays the process used and time frame needed to resolve the violations for this reporting period. The exhibit displays the number of cases where no action was required. The attached Exhibit E displays the source of the complaints for this reporting period. Additional items documented during this reporting period on closed cases:  Total Inspections (1,500)  Total Violations (1,122)  Extensions of Time Granted (74) Item 5K Page | 3  Repeat Violator Properties (39)  Tenant Occupied Properties with Violations (53)  Short Term Rental Cases (8)  Short Term Rental Renewal Permits Issued (8)  Illegal Snipe Signs Removed (1,137)  Building, Grading and Driveway Permit Cases (47)  Fees as a Result of Code Enforcement Actions (over $11,770)  Online Complaints (100) Cases are opened on properties where building, excavating, grading or driveway activities are occurring without a permit. Code enforcement continues to provide information to the public that permits are required when undergoing certain building activities, grading, or excavating projects, renting short term and driveway improvements. Enforcement actions on these types of violations are time consuming. To offset the additional costs, in accordance with the City Fee Schedule and city code, property owners or contractors that fail to obtain a permit prior to starting work are charged double the original fee. The vast majority of these cases are a result of pro-active code enforcement. In addition, Code Enforcement also has oversite on the Short-Term Rental permits and the Short-Term Rental Ordinance. Code enforcement is proactive on work done without a permit. This includes building work, driveway work, and grading work. This enforcement has resulted in an increase in residents obtaining driveway and grading permits without the need for code enforcement. This reporting period over 175 driveway permits were obtained voluntarily and another 26 were obtained because of proactive code enforcement. Prior years the average total of 20-30 driveway permits were obtained voluntarily. There was no proactive enforcement on this violation type so there were no other permits obtained for driveway work. Doing driveway work prior to obtaining a required approved driveway permit often leads to problems such as driveways too close to property lines, drainage issue, covering up water shut off access valves with concrete / asphalt, going over the allowed imperious surface calculation for the property, etc. Voluntary obtaining of grading permits has also increased. Prior years grading permits were only voluntarily obtained on average 50% of the time. The last two years 75% of the time grading permits were voluntarily obtained. This increase can be attributed to pro-active code enforcement on these violation types. Driveway and grading / landscaping contractors are now aware obtain the required permit, or risk paying a double fee when work is done without a permit. This reporting period sign placement violations became a time-consuming issue. Besides the vast increase in snipe signs placed in the right of ways which had over a 100% increase from last year; (2024 there were 535 illegal snipe signs removed and this year 1137 signs that were removed by code enforcement). There were other signs allowed by city code that became a time-consuming issue. The distance the signs could be placed next to a neighboring property was the reported code concern. City code was updated to address this obscure never reported issue. For the 3rd year code enforcement helped align a local volunteer group of teens with senior residents in need of some property cleanup, property maintenance, or yard maintenance at their properties. Residents are very appreciative of this help. The local voluntary group of teens will be available again this year. Code enforcement will again seek to assist and identify more senior property owners that need some help with maintaining their property. Conclusion Work continues to identify opportunities to refine our Code Enforcement Program to be sure we are responsive and accountable to our residents and business owners in providing good code Item 5K Page | 4 enforcement services. Increasing public awareness and public education outreach on the city codes are priorities. Voluntary compliance was achieved in over 99% of the cases in this reporting period. Once a person with a code violation/s were made aware of code violation/s, they resolved them in a timely manner. In fact, 74% of reported code violations were resolved within 14 days of the initial inspection or when the person with the violation was first notified of the violation. On average, over 86% of all cases were resolved within 30 days of the initial inspection. In 2026, code enforcement will continue to monitor the city ordinances and continue to recommend changes, as necessary. Any ordinance changes that significantly affect the residents will be promoted through updates on the code enforcement webpage, use of the digital monument signs or creation of brochures advising specific significant code changes. Code enforcement expects to spend a great deal of time updating BS&A, code enforcement handouts, and the city web page due to the city code conversion to Muni-Code and the new code numbering system changes. Five hundred forty-eight (548), cases have been closed by either meeting compliance or were deemed invalid. Some cases opened in the calendar year 2025 remain open. It is not uncommon for some cases to remain open due to pending investigations, court proceedings, and/or continued improvements to a challenging property. The use of issuing citations is a valuable code enforcement tool and is used on a limited basis. The high percentage of voluntary compliance results in few citations being issued. When a citation is issued, the court hearing proceedings can last for an extended period. This can result in long-term non-compliance. Challenging properties can be defined as properties that require a certified mailing of a final notice, the city taking action to abate a violation, or a citation being issued to help resolve code violations at the property. These types of cases amounted to less than 15% of all the cases but it is estimated they required more than 35-40% of code enforcement time and resources to resolve. Other added costs to challenging properties include the certified mailings expenses, office resources, abating a violation or use of the court system. Code enforcement will continue to work on reducing the amount of time to resolve all violations, especially challenging properties. FINANCIAL IMPACT: Proactive code enforcement has resulted in the collection of over $ 11,770.00 in fees for work being done without first obtaining a permit. As the population increases, code enforcement cases would be expected to rise. At some point in the future, it may be necessary to hire seasonal, part- time, or full-time personnel to assist in administering the caseload. ALTERNATIVES: 1. Motion and second, as part of the consent agenda, to accept the 2025 Code Enforcement Year-End Report. 2. Remove this item from the consent agenda for additional discussion. ATTACHMENTS: 1. Exhibits A-E EXHIBIT A 202 168 157 142 129 91 82 41 39 32 23 16 18% 15%14% 13% 12% 8%7% 4%3%2%2% 1% PUBLIC NUISANCE TALL GRASS PROPERTY MAINT JUNK VEHICLES PERMIT VIOLATIONS YARD PARKING JUNK RIGHT OF WAY GARBAGE REFUSE SIGNAGE ZONING USE ANIMAL Percent of Total Violations & Number in Each Category 2025 # of Violations % of Violations EXHIBIT B 0 50 100 150 200 250 48 222 47 166 24 71 71 7 97 58 164 163 93 129 28 225 34 115 28 3 202 23 242 156 82 129 39 168 32 91 41 16 142 23 202 157 # o f V i o l a t i o n s Violations Categories Violation Comparison 2023-2025 2023-1042 2024-1138 2025-1122Yearly Totals EXHIBIT C 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025 VIOLATIONS 919 832 823 1075 1128 816 959 1042 1138 1122 CLOSED CASES 633 600 762 710 551 673 761 635 554 548 919 832 823 1075 1128 816 959 1042 1138 1122 633 600 762 710 551 673 761 635 554 548 0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200 10 YEAR TOTAL VIOLATIONS AND CLOSED CASES TOTALS EXHIBIT D 101 306 63 69 9 18% 56% 12% 13% 1% 0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 5 DAYS OR LESS No Violation No Action Required 101 cases 18% 14 DAYS One Notice 306 cases 56% 28 DAYS Two Notices 63 cases 12% 60 DAYS Third/Final Notice 69 cases 13% Citation/Abatement Closed Cases 9 cases > 1% Pe r c e n t a g e Type of Notice & Length of Process to Resolve Violation(s) PROCESS FOR CLOSED 2025 CASES QUANTITY PERCENTAGE EXHIBIT E Anonymous/Combo Citizens Pro-Active Code Officer Internal Staff # of Complaints 35 206 227 80 % of Complaints 6%38%41%15% 6% 38% 41% 15% SOURCE OF 2025 CLOSED CASES