Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, January 14, 1995 TAG: 9501160033
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Roanoke County officials are offering to move Lamb's illegally parked trailer from its site in Roanoke County to Montgomery County, where mobile homes are allowed.
This involves a move of only 240 feet or so, since the trailer is on a 5-acre parcel that straddles the county line. But the move will involve a lot of work clearing trees and preparing the site. Private contractors are donating their time to the project.
"We think it's a generous and fair offer," said county spokeswoman Anne Marie Green, who added that no tax money will be used.
It's an offer the county hopes Lamb can't refuse. She was to get the offer Friday night.
Friday morning, Lamb said she was willing to cooperate with the county, but she doesn't want to wait any longer to get electricity. She has lived in the trailer since before Christmas without heat.
"It's beginning to make me feel like a criminal," she said of all the fuss over her Williby Road mobile home. "Even criminals get three hot meals a day and a warm place to sleep. I'm not even getting the benefits of being a criminal."
Lamb is in violation of Roanoke County's zoning ordinance, which prohibits single-wide homes outside trailer parks. But the only way to enforce the ordinance is to take her to court - a time-consuming process - and have a judge order her to move the trailer.
The county's one bargaining chip is power - electric power - and county officials are not letting her have any.
The county had offered to move her back to her old property and put her up in a furnished apartment until the problem was resolved. One supervisor even suggested adjusting the county line to accommodate her.
"I think the county actually is going the extra mile in this case," Green said.
Lamb moved her mobile home last month onto a 5-acre parcel, which includes 3 acres in Montgomery County and 2 acres in Roanoke County. She got a permit from Montgomery, but set the trailer up on the Roanoke side, where single-wides are forbidden.
Although the Montgomery County Health Department inspected the well and septic system before issuing a permit, it's up to property owners to make sure they're in compliance with the zoning ordinance, Roanoke County Planning Director Terry Harrington said.
Harrington guessed it would cost more than $12,000 to move the trailer far enough to put it in Montgomery County. That includes clearing trees, building a road, grading a site, pumping the existing septic system and extending the lines, and relocating telephone and power lines.
"It seems like a lot of expense over 240 feet of land that ain't worth nothing," Lamb said.
While Roanoke County staff members have tried to work with Lamb, Supervisor Ed Kohinke, who represents Williby Road and lives nearby on Bradshaw Road, wants to throw the book at her. He said she was told before the fact not to put the trailer in Roanoke County.
In a strongly worded memo to County Administrator Elmer Hodge on Thursday, Kohinke wrote, "The zoning ordinance should be enforced, ... and I ask that you do so without further ado."
Supervisors Bob Johnson and Lee Eddy also spoke up this week for protecting the "integrity of the zoning ordinance" and adhering to the wishes of some of her neighbors that the county not let her remain in violation.
Kohinke also said that with the regional Smith Gap Landfill recently opened in his neighborhood, residents are concerned about property values. If Lamb's trailer is allowed to stay, neighbors will believe that "Roanoke County truly doesn't care about our community in its willingness to trash it, pun intended."
Some mobile home supporters took exception to the charge that trailers "trash" a neighborhood.
"I think that's discrimination of people who cannot afford to build a stick-built type home," said mobile home salesman J.D. Ramsey, of Oakwood Homes in Roanoke. "These folks are entitled to have something on their property."
Mobile homes are most popular in rural areas, where they are "becoming the house of choice for some people," said a spokeswoman for the Virginia Manufactured Housing Association.
Trailers are now built to the same federal code as homes built on site but are a lot cheaper, she said, "so they're not trash."
Roanoke County has about 200 double-wide mobile homes and 550 single-wides. Across the state, single-wide mobile homes generally are unwelcome outside trailer parks, according to the state association.
by CNB