The Ground the Order Left Out

Case 23-009185 | Card 15 | 4880 T Street, Sacramento CA 95819

Every penalty order in this case quotes both halves of the rule and picks neither. Under the line "The penalty is imposed in connection with the following violations" [M146], the 06/29/2023 order [M146], the 10/17/2025 order [M585] and the 11/18/2025 order [M615] each print the Level C definition of SCC 1.28.010(D)(3)(c) in full — violations that "either: (1) are likely to cause and/or do cause harm to public or private property; or (2) show repeated or continuous noncompliance with: (i) a hearing examiner's order or orders, or (ii) orders or notices of violation issued by any agency or commission authorized to issue such orders or notices" [M146] — and nothing else: no harm named, no order or notice identified, no condition at the property. The City's own log numbers the run through the 24th penalty and directs a 25th [M010].

The City knew which half. The inspector's log entry that sent the first penalty, dated 06/28/2023, reads: "send the 1st Level C Administrative Penalty of $1000 and HSG HDB Monitoring fee for the willful disregard of orders or notices of violation issued by a City agency or commission authorized to issue such orders or notices. Failure to comply with the Notice and Order. 1.28.010 D3 (c2ii) SCC." [M025] The entry that sent the 24th, dated 11/17/2025, ends with the same sentence: "Failure to comply with the Notice and Order. 1.28.010 D3 (c2ii) SCC." [M037] That is prong (2)(ii), in the City's own words, written the day before each order went out — and it stayed in the log. The order served on the owner prints the whole definition and stops. The log's word is "willful disregard" [M025]; the rule the order prints says "repeated or continuous noncompliance" [M146]. The order the log's sentence points at is the April 12, 2023 order, whose own list said "This is not a complete Violation List of building code violations. Neither interior nor exterior has been completely inspected" [M125] (Card 10: the 23 monitoring cycles billed on that list before the City's first recorded backyard inspection). Each order carries the printed block Bo Cosley, Principal Building Inspector [M147] over its signature line — a title the code lists (SCC.15.04.100) — and the amount doubled on the 23rd with no factor applied (Card 14: the one $2,000 penalty the City's own hearing examiner reviewed was waived to $0). No Order Imposing Administrative Penalty page in the file the City produced under Request 26-1965 (All responsive records have been provided. [R.26-1965.1]) names the (c)(2)(ii) ground, the April 12, 2023 order, or the correction the owner had failed to make.

The file the City produced in 2026 shows its inspector sending every penalty, first through twenty-fourth, for "Failure to comply with the Notice and Order. 1.28.010 D3 (c2ii) SCC." [M025] — so why does the order served on the owner, twenty-four times, print the whole definition [M585] and not the (c)(2)(ii) ground, the April 12, 2023 order, or the correction the owner had failed to make?

IN PLAIN TERMS

The rule the City fined under has two paths: the property is causing harm, or the owner keeps failing to comply with a particular order or notice. The inspector wrote the path in his own log every time — "Failure to comply with the Notice and Order" [M025] — the second path. Each penalty order quotes both paths [M146] and does not say which one applies, names no order, and names nothing the owner failed to fix. The only order behind them carries a list [M125] that said neither the inside nor the outside had been completely inspected. The question for the City: the log picked the path and the order it ran against — why did the order served on the owner, twenty-four times, print the whole rule and leave that out?

RECORD CHAIN

  1. April 12, 2023 — the order the penalties answer to, and its list. The Notice and Order face recites that the property is in "sub-standard and/or dangerous condition under … Chapter 8.96 and/or Chapter 8.100" [M124] and is signed for Cosley on its face [M124]; the attached Correction List lists only B31 "Other" [M125] and B59 "Permits Required" [M125] with incomplete/partial-list language — "This is not a complete Violation List of building code violations. Neither interior nor exterior has been completely inspected" [M125] — and no structure, work item, location, or selected Level-C prong. The Violation Index later adds itemized entries opened 08/29/2025 [M012], continuing on the next page [M013]. The pre-access billing question belongs to Card 10.
  2. June 29, 2023 – November 18, 2025 — twenty-four penalties on that predicate. Administrative penalties ran from 06/29/2023 [M146] through the 11/18/2025 [M615] cycle, itemized in the master ledger [Card 11].
  3. June 28, 2023 – November 17, 2025 — the log picks the ground; the order does not. The inspector's General Case Information entry the day before each order gives the ground in one sentence: for the first penalty, "send the 1st Level C Administrative Penalty of $1000 and HSG HDB Monitoring fee for the willful disregard of orders or notices of violation issued by a City agency or commission authorized to issue such orders or notices. Failure to comply with the Notice and Order. 1.28.010 D3 (c2ii) SCC." [M025] (06/28/2023); the same sentence closes the entries for the 2nd (08/01/2023) and 3rd (09/05/2023) [M025], the 23rd (10/16/2025) [M036] and the 24th (11/17/2025) [M037]. The order mailed the next day prints the definition and stops (06/29/2023 [M146], 10/17/2025 [M585], 11/18/2025 [M615]).
  4. May 22, 2026 — the run in the produced file, numbered by the City's own log. The May file [R.26-1965] holds the Order Imposing Administrative Penalty pages of the run — among them the 06/29/2023 [M146], 10/17/2025 [M585], and 11/18/2025 [M615] orders — each headed "ORDER IMPOSING ADMINISTRATIVE PENALTY (Sacramento City Code 1.28.010)" [M146]; the City's activity log numbers the administrative penalties through the 24th (11/18/2025) and directs a 25th (11/25/2025) [M010].
  5. June 29, 2023 · October 17, 2025 · November 18, 2025 — three order pages, both halves quoted, neither picked. Under the line "The penalty is imposed in connection with the following violations [M146]," the 06/29/2023 [M146], 10/17/2025 [M585], and 11/18/2025 [M615] headers list SCC 1.28.010(D)(3)(c) in full — Level C violations are those that "either: (1) are likely to cause … harm to public or private property; or (2) show repeated or continuous noncompliance with … a hearing examiner's order … or notices of violation" [M146] — and list nothing else under that line. Those three headers state no facts showing harm to property under prong (1) and identify no order or notice that the noncompliance under prong (2) runs against. The rest of the run's order pages are not reproduced here.
  6. October 17, 2025 — the rate doubled inside the run. The last two orders — 10/17/2025 [M585] and 11/18/2025 [M615] — impose $2,000.00 rather than the $1,000.00 [M146] of the first order; the rate-change authority question is Card 14.

FULL CIRCLE

The City's first available answer is that the ground was selected: prong (2)(ii), in the inspector's log — "Failure to comply with the Notice and Order. 1.28.010 D3 (c2ii) SCC." [M025] — and every order page carries the case number that identifies the Notice and Order (23-009185 Paul Lovato 4880 T ST ADMPEN/TH [M146]).

That is the log, not the order. The page served on the owner leaves the space under "The penalty is imposed in connection with the following violations" [M146] to the definition — both halves, no hearing examiner's order, no notice of violation, no condition — and the file the City produced under Request 26-1965 (All responsive records have been provided. [R.26-1965.1]) holds no page showing the log sentence was ever served. A case number names the case; it does not name which of the order's two placeholder entries the owner had failed to correct, on a list that said of itself "Neither interior nor exterior has been completely inspected" [M125]; the appeal of that order was refused for no fee (Card 3); and the one time a penalty on this ground reached the City's own hearing examiner, she waived it to $0 (Card 14).

The City's second available answer is that the code does not require the order to say which half applies.

The City's own form does: it prints "imposed in connection with the following violations" [M585] and leaves a space for them. What the City put in that space, twenty-four times, was the rule — while its own log had the answer in one sentence.

What would defeat this card is one served Order Imposing Administrative Penalty from this run that names the (c)(2)(ii) ground and the order it runs against, or the condition at the property that caused harm. The file the City closed with "All responsive records have been provided." [R.26-1965.1] holds none. Card 4 is the completeness baseline (what the file the City produced means, and does not mean); Card 11 carries the ledger.

APPLICABLE LAW

SOURCE CITATIONS USED BY THIS CARD

CARD REFERENCES