DeKalb News: Extended stay hotel inspections lead to 2,397 citations

DeKalb County police homicide investigators investigate a death at the United Inn and Suites on Memorial Drive on April 19, 2018. The hotel is among 12 in DeKalb that received a combined 2,397 code enforcement citiations in 2018. JOHN SPINK/JSPINK@AJC.COM

Credit: JOHN SPINK / AJC

Credit: JOHN SPINK / AJC

DeKalb County police homicide investigators investigate a death at the United Inn and Suites on Memorial Drive on April 19, 2018. The hotel is among 12 in DeKalb that received a combined 2,397 code enforcement citiations in 2018. JOHN SPINK/JSPINK@AJC.COM

Twelve extended stay hotels in DeKalb County accumulated 2,397 code enforcement citations during 2018, according to a report provided to the county commission.

These hotels paid a combined $168,395 in fines for violating county fire, health and building codes. The Code Enforcement division said five of the hotels are now in compliance, and another is in the process of completing an action plan.

Four of the hotels have either closed or are in the process of shutting down.

The worst offender was United Inn and Suites in Decatur, which paid $60,345 in fines after receiving 447 citations last year. It was among four hotels along Memorial Drive that made the list.

Some of the 2,397 citations written in 2018 were carried over from cases that began the year prior. One facility, Haven Hotel in Stone Mountain, received a combined 793 citations during that two-year stretch.

Both Haven Hotel and United Inn and Suites are now in compliance with all code enforcement policies, the report said.