Moments after Washington’s City Council awarded a contract to demolish a substandard, unsafe house at 610 W. 10^th St., the council was asked to ensure the city does a better job of preventing houses from deteriorating to the point where they have to be demolished for public-safety reasons.

Dot Moate, vice chairwoman of the city’s Planning Board, said she is not familiar with the house at 610 W. 10^th St. “because it’s not on the main path,” but because its condition was discussed by the council, she believes the city needs to look at other houses that are unsightly, don’t meet applicable codes and/or are deteriorating because of neglect.

“I was in one of those homes (Monday), and I am embarrassed to say and to know that our city and our inspectors are allowing people (to allow substandard elements). … We had a contractor in there with us. It’s disgusting,” Moate said. “There’s got to be something the city can do to encourage the property owners who rent these houses to keep them in a safe (condition). The electrical in this particular house was astounding — no air conditioning. It just goes on and on.”

Moate said substandard, deteriorating structures on main thoroughfares in the city harm the city’s efforts to attract tourists to the area. “That’s what we’re spending a lot of money on — tourism. If we don’t have a thoroughfare that looks good, it’s not very good for tourists.”

Mayor Mac Hodges told Moate it takes time to bring such houses up to code and to the point they are stabilized and are not eyesores, with a lot of that time devoted to identifying property owners and contacting them, if possible, to address problems with their houses. Moate said she understands that, but she wants the city to do better when it comes to addressing substandard houses on the city’s major traffic corridors.

The $3,400 demolition contract was awarded to Dudley Landscaping.

John Rodman, the city’s community and cultural resources director, told the council that Stacy Drakeford, the city’s director of police and fire services, had concerns about the uninhabited house, which is boarded up. “About three years ago, Chief Drakeford came to us and asked — the house was abandoned at the time and vacant — if we could help secure the house because it was becoming a spot of some suspicious activity. We notified the property owner to secure the house, but they did not respond to letters. So, the city went ahead and boarded up the house.”

Rodman said the property owner did not respond other requests by the city to remedy the situation. At that point, the city began mowing the yard and performing other tasks to help keep the property from falling into more disrepair.

“I know of one thing that happened on that corner — that house right across from it on the corner, the man put cameras around his house to take pictures of what was going on it that area because they had a lot of traffic in that area. I thought maybe that would slow it down, but evidently that did not do a whole lot of good,” Councilman Richard Brooks said.