Superior Court fines Wilt $18,500

Thursday afternoon, Dr. Glen Wilt again faced Judge Bravo in the Superior Court for sentencing on 8 counts and 11 citations involving his properties in Superior. He was found guilty in absentia two weeks ago when he failed to show up for his court date where the citations were reviewed.  His failure to appear for his own court date was due to a simple mistake he explained in today’s courtroom. He had thought the court date was for 5 pm… not 2 pm. Then, he added, when he started to leave (for Superior) he got sick and “couldn’t have made it anyway.”

As a college professor, one wonders what Wilt’s response would have been were a student to miss his midterm exam with the same ‘I -didn’t-know-what-time-the-test-started-and-then-I-got-sick-and-couldn’t-have-made-it-anyway’ excuse.

As the sentencing got underway, the Town’s case centered on the fact that the citations not only involved commercial buildings which according to Melanie Oliver, Superior’s Planning and Zoning administrator, are held to a higher standard and that of the 8 cases involved, six of them had been before the court for previous violations.

Wilt then questioned Oliver on the classification of each of his properties noted in the violations and determined that 4 were residential. He also stated he had abated weeds on property identified in the citations “as of today” and asked the court to consider this in determining fines. He explained he had recently (September) worked with Adult Probation to have parole’s work on his properties but alas, this proved to be an unreliable remedy due to recidivism. Wilt asked the Court to consider that he had been making an effort.

Judge Bravo asked the Town attorney if he had would agree to consider todays efforts at weed abatement and he stated he had no problem with Wilt petitioning the court to reduce fines, but he wouldn’t gaurantee that he would agree to it reminding the Court that the fines pertain to the citations themselves which involved a lengthy process giving Wilt ample opportunity to take care of the issues before today.

Each citation carried a maximum of $2500 for each violation and the Superior Town attorney, Michael Beers, asked the Court to assess “significant fines” in this case due to several factors including the seriousness of the violations, the second-time offender status and the need to make it clear to Dr. Wilt that it would be cheaper to fix the issues in a timely manner than to go to court. Judge Bravo agreed. He assessed $1500 for each of the citataions involving weeds and junk cards, and $2000 for each citation involving dilapidated buildings. In the case a property which had citations for both weeds and dilapidated building status, the total citation assessed was $3500.

Wilt acknowledged he was not prepared to pay the fine that day but wanted time to work out a payment with the Court Clerk.

He also said he had asked for a meeting with town officials immediately after the court sentencing to get a full accounting of what he had to do to come into compliance. Whether this was a bit of grandstanding on Wilt’s part or will result in a concerted effort to get all his properties in compliance will play out over the next several months. History seems to suggest that the problem here is not knowing what needs to be done – but doing it.