Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, February 14, 1991 TAG: 9102140134
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV4 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: M.J. DOUGHERTY CORRESPONDENT
DATELINE: FLOYD LENGTH: Medium
The commission unanimously recommended to the Board of Supervisors Tuesday night that the proposed amendment to the mobile home park ordinance not be adopted.
The recommendation came after a joint public hearing of the planning commission and the supervisors. The board could act on the matter as early as its next regular meeting Feb. 19.
"I think it's a waste of time," Jerry Boothe said at the beginning of the planning commission's discussion of the matter. "It stirs up a hornets nest and we're right in the middle of it. And from all I could gather here tonight, if it meets all the criteria, it [the public hearing] won't really have any bearing."
Lowell Boothe, the supervisor's representative on the commission, agreed.
"Ninety-nine percent of the objections are going to be from someone who doesn't want it in their back yard," he said. "Whenever people hear there is a [mobile home] park proposed for their neighborhood, they are all going to be up here saying `We don't want it.'
"If we then approve it, the Planning Commission and the Board of Supervisors are the bad guys. Those people will say, `We told you we didn't want it. Then you went ahead and approved it.'"
The public hearing shed some light on why the change in the mobile home park ordinance had been proposed.
"The way I see it, the surrounding counties, the urban counties, have zoning and have made it very difficult for mobile home parks to locate there," Supervisor Howard Dickerson said in response to a question by Woody Bauer of Floyd.
"Since we [Floyd County] don't have zoning, and since we have a lot of open space, this is the most logical place for them to come," Dickerson said. "It seems like in fact they are coming.
Mobile home parks could severely affect the county's infrastructure - schools, roads, etc., he said.
"We need all the help we can get trying to decide on [a mobile home park's] impact," he said.
During the hearing, Marc Small, the county attorney, David Ingram, vice chairman of the Board of Supervisors, and Jerry Boothe of the planning commission all made it clear that other factors besides public sentiment would enter into the decision-making process.
by CNB