Town Council vows to fight unsafe and unsightly

HAYESVILLE, N.C. – Safety and appearance are the impetus behind the town council’s latest efforts to clean up congestion at the Hayesville post office and restrict signage on local highways.

Mayor Harrell Moore said he recently discussed the post office with Congressman Heath Shuler’s regional field representative, Boyce Deitz.

“He said it was a dump,” Moore reported. “I said we’ve known that for a long time.”

Sandy Zimmerman, local representative for Congressman Shuler’s office, said the Department of Transportation needed to evaluate the entire site and determine what should be done with it. Zimmerman said that issues like parking and crossing the street were becoming hazards in and of themselves.

Town Council member Gwen Weaver said automobile accidents at the post office were still common. Zimmerman agreed that the location presented a difficult safety issue.

“I’ve almost been hit down there a couple of times myself,” Zimmerman said. “Something needs to be done.”

Moore expressed concern over a recent article in the Asheville Citizen Times focused on the closing of rural post offices. He commented that Deitz said the Hayesville post office was a disgrace to the Postal Service, but that perhaps the parking situation could be remedied.

“I don’t know whether we need to get a parking lot before we get a post office or not,” Moore observed.

Zimmerman said Deitz was in the process of persuading DOT officials to inspect the spot, nothing that it might help. She said that last year her office was told there was no money available for any such project.

“I think this may wind up being a permanent part of our agenda,” town council member Harry Baughn said. “We need to just keep hammering at it until we get somebody’s attention.”

Baughn said the alternative was to wait for someone to get into an accident and sue.

“That would get their attention,” he said.

SIGNAGE

George Schaaf is going to war against illegal signs.

“[They] compromise public safety and degrade the appearance of our main thoroughfares,” Hayesville’s zoning administrator said.

Schaaf said he’s appealing for voluntary support from the community to solve the problem, which he said is worst on Highways 64 and 69.

“These [small signs] deter motorists from pulling off,” he said. “If somebody has a flat or they have any kind of problem all those signs out there kind of shy them away.”

Schaaf said the signs are also often difficult to read.

“They’re too small, so they distract the driver,” he said.

Town Council member Harry Baughn said the most frustrating signs were the ones without a clear owner, often featuring few words and a large 1-800 phone number.

“They just magically appear and you don’t know who to penalize,” Baughn said.

The Department of Transportation, which owns about nine meters of right-of-way on both sides of the asphalt, has regulations against such signs as well, Schaaf said.

“Periodically they go down and they pull those signs out,” he said, adding that the town’s sign ordinance prohibits off-premise advertising as well as ads in the right-of-way and on utility poles unless written permission is given.

Schaff urged local patrons with an interest in the welfare of the community to speak to business owners about any illegal signs that might exist.

“We have a penalty but we don’t want to go there,” he said. “We want to get things safe and looking good but the penalty’s substantial. It’s $50 a day once [a sign is] found to be a violation; that’s why we’re optimistic we’ll get voluntary compliance.”

Schaff said the town’s goal was not to collect “penalty dollars,” and encouraged citizens to contact Town Hall at 389-1862 during business hours to ask questions or report violations.

Listen to Hayesville’s February 8, 2010 Town Council meeting