CINCINNATI — With over 5,000 vacant buildings throughout Cincinnati, city council hopes a new Vacant Building Registry, approved on a 5-4 vote, will do more than the current maintenance license program to hold owners accountable.
"There are 2,800 of (approximately 5,000 vacant buildings) that we have no monitoring," councilman Mark Jeffreys told WCPO. "The water is off in those buildings. The majority has been off for five years. So, in theory, nobody should be living there. And yet 97% of them have had at least one police and fire call. In fact, on average, the average property has seven calls."
The goal of this registry is to prevent the hundreds of vacant buildings in the city from becoming uninhabitable because of code violations. The city says it costs Cincinnati taxpayers about $8.5 million a year to maintain them.
The city estimates these are the top neighborhoods with vacant buildings:
- Price Hill: 237
- Avondale: 177
- Evanston: 156
- West End: 144
- Westwood: 133
"It really breaks my heart to see the duplicated buildings that people just don't care about," Cincinnati resident Denny Dillinger told council during its Feb. 11 meeting. "They should be repaired; they should be made safe."
Hear more about how the new registry will work:
This new program requires owners of vacant properties older than six months to register with the city and allow a twice-yearly interior inspection and exterior inspections 10 times a year. The owner is required to pay a $250 fee every six months the building is vacant.
It goes into effect February 2026, with the city working now to hire the staff needed to run it.
Not all residents are supportive.
"This (is) another way to take people's property," one resident told the council. "You need to start helping the people, the taxpayers, so they can start helping fix (their) buildings up."
Some questioned the need for this registry when Cincinnati already has a "Vacant Building Maintenance License Program".
"What we have right now is very reactive and it's also very punitive," said Jeffreys. "It's reactive; it works, you complain about your neighbor's place. and so, with that you're only complaining when it's a real problem. The second issue is the current program has fines up to three thousand dollars and even criminal offenses. What this is 250 and no criminal anything."
