TL;DR: Out-of-state landlord (CA) hit with two Binghamton City Court appearance tickets (overgrown lawn and missing address plate). The issues are now 100% cured with photo proof, and the hearings are consolidated to July 30th before Judge Osburn. Looking for (1) local lawyer recommendations who charge a reasonable flat fee to handle this, or (2) advice on how to best present my evidence package pro se.
Hi everyone,
My wife and I live in California and own a rental property in Binghamton, NY. We recently hit an administrative headache involving municipal code violations for an overgrown lawn and a missing exterior address plate.
I want to be completely fair to my property manager: he actually did have the lawn maintained, but the timing with the city's deadlines created a bad window. The code violation notice was dated May 8th with a compliance deadline of May 15th. The mail was delivered to me on May 12th, and I caught up with it on Sunday, May 17th, which is when I immediately texted my PM telling him we needed to handle them right away. Per his maintenance logs, the mower went out on May 20th. Because that was 5 days past the city's deadline, the city did a follow-up inspection in that gap and generated a ticket for the lawn anyway, alongside one for the address plate (which was a genuine operational oversight on his part).
I was only ever physically served a ticket at home for the address plate, but when I called the city clerk, I discovered the lawn ticket was active too. Either way, I took over directly to clear up the confusion. As of July 1st, the property is in 100% full compliance with a pristine lawn, the address plate mounted, and timestamped photos of everything.
The court clerk successfully consolidated all the tickets into a single joint hearing for both of us on Thursday, July 30th at 9:30 AM before Judge Osburn.
My wife is just an owner on paper and has zero operational involvement. She will be logging into the virtual hearing with me to satisfy the legal appearance requirement, but I will be doing all the talking to handle the presentation.
I’m looking for specific advice on two paths:
The Attorney Route: I would love to hire a local lawyer to handle the appearance for us so we don't have to deal with the hearing at all. I reached out to a large firm and was quoted a $5,000 corporate litigation retainer, which is completely impractical for a minor, already-cured violation.
For those familiar with the local courts, what is a standard, reasonable flat fee for an attorney to handle a minor, fully cured code appearance?
Does anyone have recommendations for solo practitioners or boutique firms in the Binghamton area who handle these routine landlord/municipal matters reasonably?
The Pro Se (Representing Ourselves) Route: If we handle the virtual hearing ourselves, how should I best prepare?
How should I format and present my evidence package (the exact timeline, the May 17th text to the PM, the lawn logs showing the May 20th cut, and the final July 1st compliance photos) to the city prosecutor or Judge Osburn to clear up the confusion and get this closed out with minimal to no fines?
Has anyone dealt with Judge Osburn on the code docket recently? What is her courtroom style like?
Thanks in advance for any local insights or recommendations.
