<< Back 6/19/02 Franklin mayor breaks tie, kills weakened sign proposal By Beth Seay Franklin alderman Nancy Scott is disheartened and disappointed by the failure of the Franklin Town Board to enact a sign ordinance. The proposal was voted down June 13 after Mayor Ed Henson broke a 3-3 tie by saying the proposal would cost too much — up to $50,000 a year — to implement during a lean budget year. “We worked on this ordinance for a year,” Scott said. “It started one way, and then we changed it, trying to please everyone.” Scott said one of the changes would have allowed all signs already existing in Franklin to remain in place under a grandfather clause. The initial ordinance would have allowed about seven years to bring all signs into compliance, but that was changed to the grandfather clause. Alderman Joe Collins, Scott and town administrator Mike Decker met with Allison’s Outdoor Advertising to try to understand what would be acceptable to the sign company. Scott said the company’s biggest complaint was that if they lost one sign, it couldn’t be replaced by another. Scott said the parties did agree on the fact that signs should not be allowed in residential areas of the town (they currently are). Scott said the initially-proposed ordinance wanted to limit size and exclude billboards, but that the sign companies thought “junior billboards” were too small. Both the replacement of existing signs and the billboard sizes were changed in the ordinance to meet the needs of the signage companies. Scott said that most people who spoke at a public hearing last fall were in favor of the sign ordinance. Scott said there were people who spoke in opposition to the ordinance, including a representative from Allison Outdoor Advertising who brought letters from businesses who would be affected by the proposed ordinance. Scott also said that she held open meetings on several days for people to stop by to make comment about the signage changes, and that 12 people came by during that time. She said 11 of them were in favor of the sign ordinance as proposed. Several weeks ago the Board of Alderman held a reading and work session on the proposal, and during that meeting several more changes were made to weaken the ordinance further, said Scott. Instead of ruling that signs should be 10 feet from the DOT right-of-way, an 8-foot rule was written into the ordinance. She also said that several changes were made to the section of the ordinance governing on-premise signs, including a change in height regulations from 25 to 35 feet, and a change in allowable square footage from 150 to 200. Also, limitations on the size of signs on the sides of buildings were removed along with prohibitions on roof signage. “The only thing that would have been affected immediately ould have been portable signs and flashing signs,” said Scott. The ordinance would have required businesses erecting a sign to bring a sketch of the sign and it’s dimensions into the town offices to receive a permit before erecting qualifying signage. Aldermen Scott, Collins and Tom Woodlee voted to adopt the ordinance; Aldermen Jim Williamson, Billy Mashburn and Jerry Evans voted against it. Scott was disappointed and frustrated over the process after having worked a year on the proposed ordinance with Collins and Decker. “Now anybody can put a sign anywhere they want to,” she said. Scott thinks a sign ordinance will be in Franklin’s future. “Dillsboro, Brevard, Highlands, Sylva, Fletcher ... all have sign ordinances” she said, and businesses in those towns continue to thrive.