Lee Sterling and Thomas Lapiana

WINTER, Circuit Judge : Lee Sterling and Thomas Lapiana, two absentee landlords of multiple dwelling housing units in New York City, and the Housing Council of New York, Inc., an umbrella organization of multiple dwelling landlord groups, appeal from a judgment upholding chapter 623 of the New York Session Laws of 1979 (formerly N.Y. City Charter § 1404(d)(2)) as constitutional. This statute once governed issuance of summonses for violations of New York City's sanitation code. Appellants claim, inter alia, that the nail and mail procedure provided by the statute failed to provide adequate notice of violations as required by federal due process. After extended proceedings covering several years, including a trial and several factfinding hearings before a magistrate, final judgment was entered for defendants. This judgment, which held the statute constitutional both on its face and as applied, was based in large part on: (i) the fact that appellees had complied with instructions from the district court to reform their enforcement practices and to have the statute amended; and (ii) the assumption that there were not outstanding violations based on the earlier statute and enforcement practices that the City was seeking to enforce. Because default judgments against Sterling and Lapiana based on the earlier statute are still the subject of enforcement activity, we must address the merits. We find that chapter 623 was unconstitutional as applied to them, and reverse.