8.30.030 Nuisances declared | Covington Municipal Code

8.30.030 Nuisances declared.

The following specific acts, omissions, places and conditions are declared to be public nuisances:

(1) Erecting, continuing or using any building or other place in the City for the exercise of any trade, employment or manufacturing operation, which by occasioning noxious exhalation, offensive smells or other annoyances, becomes injurious and dangerous to the health, comfort or property of individuals or the public;

(2) Keeping or maintaining any dangerous, decaying, falling, or damaged dwelling, or other structure;

(3) Keeping, using or maintaining any pen, stable, lot, place or premises in which any animal may be confined or kept, in such a manner to be noxious, foul or offensive to individuals or the public;

(4) Obstructing or encroaching upon or rendering unsafe for passage any public highway, private street, street, alley, sidewalk, crossing, park, square, driveway, lake, or stream in the City; provided, that this subsection shall not apply to events, parades, or the use of the streets or public rights-of-way when authorized by the City;

(5) Making or keeping any explosive or combustible substance in the City, or carrying it through the streets thereof, in a quantity or manner prohibited by Chapter 70.74 RCW;

(6) Placing, depositing, keeping, having or leaving in or upon any private lot, building, structure or premises or in or upon any street, avenue, park, sidewalk, waterway, parkway or public or private place in the City any one or more of the following conditions, places or things:

(a) Any putrid, unhealthy or unwholesome bones, meat, hides, skins, or the whole or any part of any dead animal, fish or fowl, or waste parts of fish, vegetable or animal matter in any quantity; but nothing herein shall prevent the temporary retention of waste in approved covered receptacles;

(b) Privies, vaults, drains, sewer and septic tanks, cesspools, sumps, pits or like places which are not securely protected from flies or rats, or which are noxious, foul, malodorous or injurious to the public health;

(d) Refuse or feces which constitute a health hazard;

(e) Vegetation which overhangs a street, sidewalk or alley in such a way as to impede the free and full use of said street, sidewalk or alley, and vegetation which obstructs the vision of drivers such that traffic regulation signs or view of an intersection is obstructed from a position of 30 feet or closer to the intersection, and vegetation which creates injury to or other opportunity or risk of injury to passersby of the general public;

(f) Animal manure in any quantity which is not securely protected from flies and/or the elements, or which is kept or handled in violation of any ordinances of the city;

(g) An accumulation of material, including but not limited to tin cans, bottles, glass, plastic, scrap metal, ashes, wire, bric-a-brac, broken crockery, broken glass, broken plaster, trash, litter, weeds, grass, rags, garbage, accumulations of empty barrels, boxes, crates, packing cases, mattresses, bedding, excelsior, packing straw, or other packing materials or building materials which are not properly stored or neatly piled, and all such trash or abandoned material unless the same be kept in covered bins or galvanized iron receptacles approved by the enforcement officer; provided, however, this section shall exclude residential composting piles not greater than 25 square yards in area;

(h) Broken or discarded furniture, furnishings, appliances, household equipment and other similar items, in any front yard, back yard, side yard or vacant lot;

(i) Any abandoned, unattended or discarded icebox, refrigerator, freezer or other container having an air-tight door or lid and a snap lock or other locking device which may not be easily released from the inside when such lid or door is in a closed position;

(j) In a place accessible to children, any attractive nuisance dangerous to children, including but not limited to any abandoned, broken or neglected equipment, machinery, refrigerator, freezer or other large appliance;

(k) Any abandoned or unused well, pit, shaft, cistern, or storage tank without first demolishing or removing from the premises such storage tanks, or securely closing and barring any entrance or trapdoor thereto, or without filling any well, pit, shaft or cistern or capping the same with sufficient security to prevent access thereto;

(l) Nonoperational or abandoned vehicles or parts thereof, or other articles of personal property that are discarded or left in a state of partial construction or repair in any front yard, side yard, rear yard, or vacant lot. The responsible person may have on his or her premises, at any one time, only one nonoperational or abandoned vehicle outside an enclosed building for a period not to exceed 14 days. (Ord. 05-16 § 1 (Exh. A); Ord. 21-01 § 1; Ord. 28-99 § 1)