[HISTORY: Adopted by the Board of Supervisors of the Township of Hanover 9-9-2008 by Ord. No. 08-09. Amendments noted where applicable.]
GENERAL REFERENCES
Health and nuisances — See Ch. 95.
Junkyards and junk dealers — See Ch. 106.
Property maintenance — See Ch. 133.
Solid waste — See Ch. 148.
Exposed water hazards — See Ch. 176.
The following words and phrases, when used in this chapter, shall have the meanings ascribed to them in this section, except where the context or language clearly indicates or requires a different meaning:
ACCESSORY STRUCTURE
A detached structure which is not used or not intended to be used for living or sleeping by human occupants and which is located on or partially on any premises.
BREEDING AREA
Any condition which provides the necessary environment for the birth or hatching of vectors.
COLLECTION OF WATER
Water contained in ditches, pools, ponds, streams, excavations, holes, depressions, open cesspools, privy vaults, fountains, cisterns, tanks, shallow wells, barrels, troughs, urns, cans, boxes, bottles, tubs, buckets, roof gutters, tires, tanks of flush closets, reservoirs, vessels, receptacles of any kind or other containers or devices which may hold water.
DILAPIDATED
Fallen into partial ruin or decay.
DISPOSAL
Includes the storage, collection, disposal or handling of refuse.
DWELLING
A building or structure used for residential purposes.
DWELLING UNIT
One or more rooms in a dwelling which room or rooms have fixed cooking facilities arranged for occupancy by one person, two or more persons living together or one family.
EXTERMINATION
The control and elimination of vectors by eliminating their harborage places; by removing or making inaccessible materials that may serve as their food; by poisoning, spraying, fumigating, fogging, larviciding or trapping; or by any other recognized and legal vector control elimination methods approved by the local or state authority having such administrative authority.
GARBAGE
All animal and vegetable wastes resulting from the handling, preparation, cooking or consumption of foods.
HARBORAGE
Any place where vectors can live, nest or seek shelter.
OCCUPANT
Any person, over one year of age, living, sleeping, cooking or eating in or actually having possession of a dwelling unit or a rooming unit, except that in dwelling units a guest will not be considered an occupant.
OWNER
Any person who, alone or jointly or severally with others:
A. 
Has legal title to any premises, dwelling or dwelling unit, with or without accompanying actual possession thereof; or
B. 
Has charge, care or control of any premises, dwelling or dwelling unit as owner or agent of the owner or an executor, administrator, trustee or guardian of the estate of the owner. Any such person thus representing the actual owner shall be bound to comply with the provisions of this chapter and of the rules and regulations adopted pursuant thereto to the same extent as if he were the owner.
PERSON
Any natural person, firm, partnership, association, corporation, company or organization of any kind.
REFUSE
All solid wastes, except body wastes, and shall include garbage, ashes and rubbish.
RUBBISH
Includes glass, metal, paper, plant growth, wood or nonputrescible solid wastes.
TOWNSHIP OF HANOVER
The Board of Supervisors of the Township of Hanover, Northampton County, Pennsylvania.
VECTOR
A rodent, arthropod or insect capable of transmitting a disease or infection. Vectors shall include but not be limited to rats, mosquitoes, cockroaches, flies, ticks, etc.
VECTOR CONTROL OFFICER
Such person or agency, or both, so designated by the Township.
VECTORPROOFING
A form of construction to prevent the ingress or egress of vectors to or from a given space or building or from gaining access to food, water or harborage. This term shall include but not be limited to ratproofing, flyproofing, mosquitoproofing, etc.
A. 
No person shall deposit any refuse, offal, pomace, dead animals, decaying matter or organic substance of any kind in or upon any private lot, building structure, accessory structure or premises or in or upon any street, avenue, alley, parkway, ravine, ditch or gutter or into any of the runs, creeks or bodies of water within or bounding the Township so that the same shall or may afford food, harborage or breeding areas for rats, flies or other vectors.
B. 
No person shall deposit or permit to accumulate in or upon any premises, improved or vacant, or on any open lot or alley any lumber, boxes, barrels, bottles, cans, glass, scrap iron, wire, metal articles, pipe, broken stone or cement, broken crockery, broken plaster or rubbish of any kind, unless the same is kept in approved covered receptacles or placed on open racks that are elevated not less than 18 inches above the ground and evenly piled or stacked or disposed of as may be approved by the Department of Environmental Protection or the Township.
C. 
No person shall maintain a junkyard or a place for the dumping or wrecking or disassembling of automobiles, trucks, tractors or machinery of any kind or for the storing or leaving of dilapidated, wrecked or abandoned automobiles, trucks, tractors or machinery of any kind or of any of the parts thereof or for the storing or leaving of any machinery or equipment used by contractors or builders or by other persons in such a manner as may afford harborage or breeding areas for rats or other vectors.
D. 
No person shall store refuse in containers other than those which are made of durable, watertight, rust-resistant material having a close-fitting lid which must be kept on the container when in use or in plastic bags which are durable and watertight and are secured or tied. These containers must be kept clean by thorough rinsing and draining as often as necessary so as not to provide food or breeding areas for flies.
E. 
No person shall construct, maintain or use a sewage system, privy, urinal, cesspool or other receptacle for human excrement so that vectors may have access to the excrementitious matter contained therein.
F. 
No person shall have, keep, maintain, cause or permit any collection of standing or flowing water in which mosquitoes breed or are likely to breed, unless such collection of water is treated or maintained effectually so as to prevent such breeding.
A. 
Every owner of a dwelling containing two or more dwelling units shall maintain in a clean and sanitary condition the shared or public areas of the dwelling and premises thereof.
B. 
Every occupant of a dwelling or dwelling unit shall maintain in a clean and sanitary condition that part or those parts of the dwelling, dwelling unit and premises thereof that he occupies and controls.
C. 
Every occupant of a dwelling containing a single dwelling unit shall be responsible for the extermination of insects or rodents on the premises. Every occupant of a dwelling unit, in a dwelling containing more than one dwelling unit, shall be responsible for such extermination whenever his dwelling unit is the only one infested, except that where infestation is caused by failure of the owner to maintain the dwelling in a rodentproof or reasonable insectproof condition, extermination shall be the responsibility of the owner. Whenever infestation exists in two or more of the dwelling units in any dwelling or in the shared or public parts of any dwelling containing two or more dwelling units, extermination shall be the responsibility of the owner.
A. 
Any dwelling, building, structure, accessory structure, premises or any other place may be required to be vectorproofed when found by the Township to be providing harborage or breeding areas for rats, flies, mosquitoes or any other vectors.
B. 
No owner, occupant, contractor, public utility company, plumber or any other person shall remove or fail to restore in like condition the vectorproofing from any building, structure or accessory structure for any purpose.
A program plan and specifications for private vector control programs may be required to be submitted to the Township as deemed necessary by the Township. The program plan shall be submitted by the owner or agent of the property on or in which the vector control program is or will be conducted. The program plan shall state the type of vectors to be controlled, the name of the company contracted to carry out the program and any and all work to be conducted in an effort to control the vectors. If, after review of the program plan by the Township, it is found to be inadequate or incomplete, additional information may be required, as well as additional control methods.
A. 
The Township Code Enforcement Officer is empowered to make inspections of the interior and exterior of all dwellings, buildings, structures and accessory structures, premises, collections of water or any other places to determine full compliance with this chapter and to determine evidence of vector infestation and the need for vectorproofing or additions or repairs to existing vectorproofing.
B. 
Whenever it is determined that any dwelling, building, structure, accessory structure, premises, collection of water or any other place is in violation of this chapter, a written notice shall be issued setting forth the alleged violations and advising the owner, occupant, operator or agent that such violations must be corrected. The notice may be personally served upon the owner, occupant, operator or agent or served upon the same by certified mail. The time for the correction of the violations must be given, as well as the necessary methods to be employed in the correction, which time shall not exceed 30 days.
C. 
Whenever the violations fail to be corrected within the time set forth in the written notice, the Township may proceed to abate the violations in the manner provided by law.
Whoever violates any provision of this chapter shall be fined not less than $500 and not more than $1,000, and the costs of prosecution. Each day's violation of any provision of this chapter shall constitute a separate offense. In default of the payment of such fine and costs, the person shall undergo imprisonment for a period of not more than 30 days.