NEWBURGH – Following revelations that home improvement was conducted on Victor Marchmon’s home without any Newburgh permits being written, city officials plan to explore the situation further and consider ways to prevent this type of behavior to occur again.
City Code Compliance Supervisor Steven Hunter said Tuesday that when the work was done some two years ago, no permits were given and he had no proof that the contractor had performed any of the work because he was never onsite when he went to the North Miller Street home. Hunter said he would perform an immediate inspection on Marchmon’s home and consider the options he faces.
City Manager Michael Ciaravino said they want to make sure that unscrupulous contractors do not think Newburgh residents are “an easy mark” when it comes to home improvements.
“Moving forward, we want to have a protocol in place that if fraud is suspected there is automatically a referral from the building department to the police department and if work was performed without a permit, to immediately obtain information from the homeowner or whoever paid for the work, who the contractor was and provide that information to the police department, but then have follow up from the building department on why a permit was not pulled and why a permit was not pulled and whether or not there should be a citation issued to the contractor,” Ciaravino told MidHudsonNews.com.
