Glendale, CA Property Maintenance: Property Blight (2026)

Acting under authority the state grants cities in Vehicle Code Sec. 48 finds that accumulated abandoned, wrecked, dismantled or inoperative vehicles reduce property values, promote blight and deterioration, invite plundering, create fire hazards and attract minors into danger (Sec. 010). A vehicle is 'inoperative' if it is mechanically incapable of being driven or barred from public roads under Vehicle Code registration, equipment or safety provisions (Sec. 020). Two narrow exceptions apply: a vehicle completely enclosed in a building and not visible from the street, or one lawfully stored on a licensed dismantler's, dealer's or junk dealer's business premises (Sec.

030). The director of community development discovers and initiates abatement (Sec. 080), mailing a ten-day notice of intention to abate to both the land owner and the registered vehicle owner (Sec. 090). Either owner can request a hearing within that ten days; if the land owner instead submits a sworn statement denying responsibility, that itself is treated as a hearing request (Sec. 090(A)-(B)). A hearing officer weighs the evidence and, if the vehicle was placed without the land owner's consent and the owner never acquiesced, the removal costs cannot be assessed against that owner (Sec.

110(C)). 88 (Sec. 120). Once an abatement order becomes final, the vehicle must be scrapped within five days (or fifteen days after a council appeal) and may never be reconstructed or made operable again, except vehicles that qualify for horseless-carriage or historical vehicle license plates under Vehicle Code Sec. 5004 (Sec. 130). Unpaid administrative and removal costs become a special assessment against the parcel, collected through the county tax roll under Government Code Sec. 5 (Sec. 150).