Cleveland County, NC Property Maintenance: Property Blight (2026)

§ 153A-140, declares specific conditions on any parcel with an inhabited dwelling in unincorporated Cleveland County to be dangerous and prejudicial to public health and safety and therefore violations in their own right. The list is broad: accumulated solid waste, and "trash, garbage, offal, stagnant water, overgrown grasses or vegetative growth, building materials, glass, wood, household appliances, tools, inoperative lawn care equipment, broken, inoperative, or discarded furniture or other household equipment, packing boxes, discarded clothing, junk metal, automobile parts, tires, inoperative boats, motorized equipment or machinery" kept in a manner harmful to health or injurious to neighboring property.

The section separately reaches kudzu, honeysuckle, ivy or other woody or vine-type growth that spreads beyond the property line onto fences, buildings, trees or utilities, but exempts bona fide farms and vegetation that has been reasonably maintained. 7-6: a county-designated agent may inspect with consent or an administrative search warrant, the county attorney sends written notice of the alleged violation giving the owner ten calendar days to abate, and the owner may request an administrative hearing before the county manager within that window, which temporarily suspends the abatement order pending a hearing held within five business days.

A property owner cited three or more times in a calendar year is a "chronic violator" and can be abated without further notice that year. If the county performs the abatement itself, the actual cost is charged to the owner, due within thirty calendar days, and becomes a lien on the property collected the same way as unpaid taxes.