
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, May 27, 1990                   TAG: 9005290205
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: F-6   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

SIGNS OF STRAIN IN FRANKLIN

IF YOU think squabbling among the Roanoke Valley's four localities can get a little weird, take a gander at Franklin County. There, neighborly disputation has become even more finely honed: The squabbling is among seven election districts that are all part of the same locality.

The issue du jour is zoning - which, come to think of it, has been an issue in Franklin for a lot of jours.

The county got its first zoning ordinance just a couple of years ago. Getting it required a compromise. Land use was zoned in four election districts but not in the other three, unless you count an informal designation of A.G. for "Anything Goes": toxic dumps, moonshine stills, whatever.

There at least is an underlying social and geographic rationale for the arrangement in Franklin, which is more than can be said for the Roanoke Valley's political balkanization. The four zoned districts abut either Smith Mountain Lake or the towns of Rocky Mount and Boones Mill, where growth has made more pressing the need for zoning. The three unzoned districts are rural areas where growth is slow or non-existent.

But Franklin's zone/no-zone arrangement is showing signs of strain. One sign came the other day when two supervisors who represent zoned districts said the entire ordinance should be reviewed.

Supervisor Charles Ellis came up with a good idea - that the whole county should be zoned. Supervisor Mike Brooks came up with a strange one. Only the four supervisors who represent zoned districts, he said, should be allowed to vote on individual rezoning requests.

Brooks' dissatisfaction may be understandable. It was expressed after the board deadlocked 3-3 on a petition for a sheet-metal shop near Rocky Mount. Brooks, from a zoned district, favored granting a bit of leeway; two of the "no" votes, favoring a more rigid stand, were cast by supervisors from districts where zoning is a dirty word.

Still, when Brooks says supervisors from unzoned districts shouldn't participate in zoning decisions because they have no vested interest in the law, he is in error.

In a way, the opposite is the case: People without a vested interest ought to be making the decisions.

But it isn't really a vested interest that's under discussion. By contributing to the welfare of some parts of the county, a successful ordinance contributes to the welfare of the county as a whole. Under discussion is the wholly legitimate interest that all supervisors should have, regardless of the district they represent, in the wisdom of zoning and the success of the ordinance.

by CNB