Richmond Fire Damage Rules: The Thirty Day Plan

What the Statute Is For

Spot blight abatement exists to deal with individual properties rather than areas. That is the "spot" in the name: it reaches a single structure whether or not it sits inside a conservation or redevelopment area.

Under subsection A of section 36-49.1:1, an authority or any locality has the power to acquire or repair any blighted property as defined in section 36-3, by purchase or through the exercise of eminent domain provided in Chapter 2 of Title 25.1, and further has the power to hold, clear, repair, manage or dispose of such property.

What Makes a Property Blighted?

Section 36-3 defines blighted property as any individual commercial, industrial or residential structure or improvement that endangers the public's health, safety or welfare because the structure or improvement upon the property is dilapidated, deteriorated, or violates minimum health and safety standards, or any structure previously designated as blighted under this process. Nothing in that requires neglect over years. A serious fire produces the condition described in a single afternoon.

The Document at the Centre of It

The definition worth reading closely, because it allocates the work. A spot blight abatement plan means the written plan prepared by the owner or owners of record of the real property to address spot blight.

Prepared by the owner. The statute's default is that you write it, and the whole procedure is built around giving you the chance to.

The same definition then supplies the consequence of silence: if the owner or owners of record fail to respond as provided in section 36-49.1:1, the locality or the authority can prepare a spot blight abatement plan.

Why Does It Matter Who Drafts It?

Because a plan written by the party whose objective is removing blight is optimised for removing blight. A plan written by the owner can account for an insurance claim that has not settled, a probate that is not finished, a contractor who cannot start until spring, and an intention to keep the house. Those are all legitimate and none of them appears unless somebody puts them on paper.

The Thirty Days

The owner or owners of record have 30 days from the date the notice is sent in which to respond in writing with a spot blight abatement plan to address the blight within a reasonable time.

From the date the notice is sent. Not from the date it is received, opened, forwarded or understood. On a vacant or inherited property where post is accumulating at the house itself, that distinction consumes the entire window.

Where the Notice Goes

The statute is specific in the nuisance context, and the same practical point runs through the whole procedure: written notice by certified mail to the owner or owners at the last known address of such owner as shown on the current real estate tax assessment books or current real estate tax assessment records.

So the address that matters is the one the assessment records hold, which for an executor, an heir or an owner who has moved is frequently not the address they actually use. Checking and correcting it is free and it is the cheapest protective step available in this entire area.

What Should the Plan Actually Say?

The statutory test is that it addresses the blight within a reasonable time and is acceptable to the chief executive of the agency, authority or locality. In practice that points at specifics: what the current condition is, what you intend to do, in what sequence, by roughly when, and what is holding it up. A short, dated, honest page is a stronger document than a long, vague one. What it should not be is silence.

We publish no assessment of any particular property's blight status, and nothing here is legal advice. This is a statute that ends in eminent domain or a lien, and a Virginia land use lawyer is the right reader for a notice about your specific property.

If No Acceptable Plan Arrives

Under subsection C, if the owner or owners of record fail to respond within the 30-day period with a written spot blight abatement plan that is acceptable to the chief executive of the agency, authority or locality, the agency, authority or locality may request the locality to declare the property blighted.

From there the two routes diverge, and the statute makes clear they are alternatives rather than a sequence.

Route One: Acquisition or Repair

The powers in subsection A: acquire or repair, by purchase or by eminent domain, then hold, clear, repair, manage or dispose of the property. The authority and locality also have power to recover the costs of any repair or disposal from the owners of record.

Under subsection G, where the ordinance is adopted, the locality has a lien on all property repaired or acquired under an approved spot blight abatement plan, to recover the cost of improvements made to bring the property into compliance with applicable building codes, and the cost of disposal if any.

That lien is filed in the circuit court where the property is located and is subordinate to any prior liens of record. The governing body may recover its costs of repair from the owners when the property is sold or disposed of by them, and where the property has been acquired through eminent domain, the cost of repair may be recovered when the governing body sells or disposes of it.

Route Two: Nuisance Abatement

The alternative in subsection G. In lieu of acquisition by eminent domain and in lieu of the other powers, a locality may by ordinance declare any blighted property as defined in section 36-3 to constitute a nuisance, and thereupon abate the nuisance pursuant to section 15.2-900 or section 15.2-1115.

Such an ordinance may be adopted only after written notice by certified mail to the owner at the address shown on the current real estate tax assessment records.

How Is the Lien Different on This Route?

It carries interest. Where the owner does not abate or remove the nuisance and the locality does so at its expense, the costs of removal or abatement are a lien on the property, and that lien bears interest at the legal rate of interest established in section 6.2-301, beginning on the date the removal or abatement is completed and running through the date on which the lien is paid. The subsection G acquisition lien is not expressed the same way, which is a meaningful difference on a position left outstanding for years.

Cumulative, Not Exclusive

Subsection J is short and worth knowing: the provisions of this section are cumulative and are in addition to any remedies for spot blight abatement that may be authorised by law.

So this statute sits alongside whatever else a locality has available rather than replacing it. An owner reasoning that the spot blight route has not been used, and therefore nothing can happen, is reasoning from one provision among several.

Your Options, Compared

File a plan. The route the statute is built around, and the only one where the owner sets the terms.

File a plan that involves selling. Still a plan. Whether it is acceptable is for the chief executive, and it is worth stating rather than assuming.

Sell before anything is sent. The cleanest position, because no clock is running and nothing is recorded.

Say nothing. The route where somebody else writes the plan for your property.

Across Richmond and the Region

Each locality administers this itself. The historic east is covered under Church Hill and the East End, the north under Northside, and the south of the river under Southside and Manchester. Further pages deal with the Fan and the near West End, Henrico and Chesterfield and the wider region.

Those surrounding areas include Petersburg, Hopewell, Colonial Heights, Ashland, Glen Allen, Midlothian and Mechanicsville, each with its own administration.

The full index is on our service area index.

Rules Questions

Has a Notice Been Sent About My Property?

Your locality will tell you, and it is worth asking rather than waiting to find out. Check the address on the assessment records at the same time.

Is Thirty Days Really the Whole Window?

It is the period for responding in writing with a plan, running from the date the notice is sent. What follows a response is a different conversation from what follows silence.

Should I Get a Lawyer?

Where a notice has arrived, yes. This is a statute whose endpoints include eminent domain and a recorded lien.

Primary Sources

Code of Virginia section 36-49.1:1, subsections A, C, G and J
Code of Virginia section 36-3 — blighted property and spot blight abatement plan
Code of Virginia sections 15.2-900 and 15.2-1115 — nuisance abatement
Code of Virginia Title 25.1 Chapter 2, section 25.1-200 and following — eminent domain
Code of Virginia section 6.2-301 — legal rate of interest