OPRA Abandoned/VACANT/Probate- Middlesex
Dear South River Borough,
I appreciate your consideration of the following matter. Under OPRA and the Common Law Right of Access, I am requesting a current list of records over the past 2 YEARS for each of the following be delivered via e-mail in EXCEL format:
1) All abandoned/vacant residential properties (Property Class 2)
2) All condemned properties
3) All residential properties with delinquent taxes
4) All residential properties for which a Lis Pendens notice has been filed or that are currently in probate
5) All properties that are absentee-owned
6) All properties with delinquent water and sewer which date back up to 1 year, including amounts owed
7) All properties currently listed with water shut-off notice
8) All properties with code violations, including the type of violation
9) All properties with notices of abatement
Again, I appreciate your attention to this matter and thank you in advance for your help.
Yours faithfully,
Ben
Good Morning,
The borough has received your request.
A proper request under OPRA must identify with reasonable clarity those documents that are desired, and a party cannot satisfy this requirement by simply requesting all of an agency's documents. See Bent v. Stafford Police Department, 381 N.J.Super. 30, 37 (App. Div. 2005). Custodians are not required to conduct research or create new records in response to an OPRA request.
While some of the records you seek are in electronic databases that have keyword search functions ( tax delinquencies, water& sewer delinquencies) other requests are only in paper form (code violations, notice of abatement) and those are filed by property. Records that are in databases, the Borough can run searches to generate a report, paper records filed by lot and block the Borough would have to search all of its files to determine if any violation exist for the given time frame, therefore this request is invalid because it would require research (the borough would have to decide if a record is responsive to the request) and would pose a significant disruption to our operations (the time need to look through every property file to too cumbersome.
Property ownership records can be found online here https://tax1.co.monmouth.nj.us/cgi-bin/p... which is a database not maintained by the Borough. While the owner may or may not have an address different from the property, there is no way for the Borough to know if the property is absentee owned.
The Borough had created a list of vacant and abandoned properties but it is now two years old and has not been maintained. Would you want that list?
The borough will need additional time to provide the information requested, where available and a valid request under OPRA. The dealine to respond to this request is extended to July 31, 2020
Bill Bray, RMC
Borough Clerk
Borough of South River
48 Washington Street
South River, NJ 08882
(732) 257-1999, ext. 525
Fax (732) 613-6105
Dear Bill Bray,
okay that is fine, the records that are available electronically will be fine. Thank you for your email !
Yours sincerely,
Ben
Good afternoon,
Attached please find a list delinquent taxes as well as list of properties with tax liens. These are in response to requested item 3, 6 below. The Borough does not maintain lists or databases for items 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7 (these have been no shut offs as per Gov. Murphy Covid Executive Order requesting the suspension of shut offs), 8 and 9. These records are not in electronic form and therefore cannot be search by a keyword or have a report generated base on any of your requests. The Borough will place properties on the Tax Sale list and therefore may have sold alien based on the non-payment of municipal utilities in the past. If you have a specific property we can inquire to what was owed that generated a specific lien.
This request has been fulfilled. Please submit a new request should you require additional documents.
Bill Bray, RMC
Borough Clerk
Borough of South River
48 Washington Street
South River, NJ 08882
(732) 257-1999, ext. 525
Fax (732) 613-6105