WHEELING - City leaders plan to use their home rule powers to recover $209,290 from 17 property owners for demolishing structures that were deemed dilapidated.

"For the first time, the city will be able to use its home rule powers to collect liens," Councilman James Tiu said regarding the plan that will allow Wheeling to force the sale of neglected property. The program will assist the city's efforts to reclaim money spent on demolitions, asbestos abatements and related activities associated with the properties.

With the final vote on the ordinance establishing the liens set for Sept. 15, council plans to place liens on the last known owners of 17 properties.

Phone numbers for most of the property owners in question were unavailable. Numbers for Constance Slotwinski, who is listed as the owner of an Eoff Street property, and Helen M. Gorshe, who owns property on McColloch Street, had been disconnected. A representative at the Church of God and Saints in Christ said he was unaware of any relationship between the church and a property listed under its ownership at 1112 McColloch St.

"This is an example of how home rule authority will come into play to try to collect taxpayers' money that was expended on private property," City Manager Robert Herron said of the program.

But Herron noted the city would only require the real estate transactions "through due process." City Solicitor Rosemary Humway-Warmuth said the action of mandating sales would be "way down the road," only occurring after proper warnings and letters had been issued to all owners.

This year, Wheeling is scheduled to spend $200,000 worth of federal Community Development Block Grant money to demolish 32 dilapidated buildings.

Wheeling is moving forward with its lien collection plan as the West Virginia Municipal Home Rule Pilot Program is being challenged in Cabell County Circuit Court. The West Virginia Insurance Federation has challenged the constitutionality of home rule as part of its efforts to overturn a Huntington law.

If home rule is ruled unconstitutional, each of the ordinances adopted under the program by Wheeling, Huntington, Charleston and Bridgeport, W.Va., would be declared invalid.

In addition to the ability to require real estate sales to collect liens, home rule allows Wheeling to charge registration fees for vacant structures and issue conditional use zoning permits. Officials have said the three provisions, specifically the provisions for lien collections and vacant structures, are designed to "work together" to help the city remove slum and blight.