Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, February 10, 1993 TAG: 9302100274
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-8 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: LON WAGNER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
SUPERVISORS BALK ON REFERENDUM
FRANKLIN COUNTY supervisors asked the General Assembly to allow referendums on land-use zoning. Now, with the legislature ready to give that approval, a majority of the board says it won't put the issue on the ballot.
The decades-long battle over land-use zoning in Franklin County nearly ended in December, but the Board of Supervisors bent to the possibility of allowing referendums.
Then the debate shifted to Richmond, where the General Assembly was to decide whether to allow advisory referendums in the county's three unzoned voting districts.
Tuesday morning, when the House of Delegates voted 88-6 to allow the referendums, it became clear the controversy was headed back where many think it should have been resolved in the first place: with the Board of Supervisors.
Upon hearing of the vote, Supervisor Gus Forry pointed out that the board still would have to vote to put the referendums on the November ballot.
"I don't think the board's going to vote to put it on," Forry said, "and I think the state ought to keep it's nose out of it."
Several board members said they were caught off guard at a Dec. 15 public hearing when Dels. Willard Finney, D-Rocky Mount; Ward Armstrong, D-Martinsville; and Sen. Virgil Goode, D-Rocky Mount, agreed to sponsor legislation that would allow the referendums.
A zoning opponent at the December meeting read a letter signed by the three legislators in which they agreed to push for the legislation. Board members said they didn't know about the letter until it was read at the meeting.
"I think this thing may have been orchestrated by some of the legislators," said Gills Creek Supervisor Charles Ellis. "I don't like getting caught blindsided."
Both houses of the General Assembly have approved the legislation - though differences still need to be ironed out - that would permit residents of the Blue Ridge, Blackwater and Snow Creek districts to vote on zoning.
Union Hall District Supervisor Lois English, who represents a district that was zoned in 1988, said some of her constituents also would like to vote on the issue.
"I have no alternative but to do what my people are telling me," English said. "They say it should be countywide or not at all."
English said she will have to vote against putting the issue on the ballot.
Hubert Quinn, the Blue Ridge district supervisor who was elected as a zoning foe, said he doesn't understand why some board members are upset with the legislators. The legislators wouldn't have pushed for the bill in Richmond if the supervisors hadn't requested it.
"They've done what we asked them to do," Quinn said.
Jerry Hodges, chairman of a citizens' group formed to oppose zoning, said zoning foes had assumed that if the General Assembly approved the bill, the supervisors would go forward with the referendums.
The newly formed group, called Franklin County Citizens for Democratic Action, is continuing to add members and is thinking about hiring an attorney, Hodges said.
If the board refuses to put the issue on the ballot, Hodges said, the supervisors will be voted out during the next election.
"If they do that," he said, "they're going to be asking for problems."