Daniel Prince
Through trucks would be prohibited on certain city roads under ordinance
At Tuesday’s meeting of Union City Council, council unanimously passed second and final reading of an ordinance amending a couple of sections of the Union City Code. City Attorney Larry Flynn was not able to attend Tuesday’s meeting, but last month, he explained that the Public Safety Department and the courts wanted those sections to be looked at and changed to clear some things up. The current code combines assault and battery and public disorderly conduct into a single section, while the proposed new ordinance lets Chapter 16, section 4 deal solely with assault and battery, and then splits Chapter 16, section 5.1 into subsections a and b to define disorderly conduct and to define what “public” means in relation to the charge.
Council also unanimously passed first reading of an ordinance authorizing the city to join new local revenue services programs. Finance Director Laura Hembree explained that the Municipal Association of South Carolina collects business license taxes for certain insurance companies, brokers, and telecommunications companies and then distribute them to the municipalities across the state. The Municipal Association has rebranded the programs as Local Revenue Services and changed the names of the individual programs. Because of that and because of a change to the state’s business licensing law, the city has to pass a new ordinance to authorize its continued participation.
Council also unanimously passed first reading of an ordinance amending chapter 14, section 14-1 and sections 14-7 through 14-22 of the city code. These sections deal with truck routes in the city. The changes amend a reference to the SC Code of Laws in section 1, and it deletes sections 7-22. Dump trucks, tractor-trailers, and semitrailer combinations would be prohibited from operating on no through truck routes, unless they are making pickups, deliveries, or have other specific business in those areas. The ordinance states that all city streets not designated by the SCDOT as a statewide truck route as provided for in their current official Overweight Truck Route Map would be designated as no through truck routes. Signs would be put up on some of the roads designating them as no through truck routes. If damage is caused to streets, infrastructure, or public property as a result of violating the ordinance, a person, corporation, or business entity would be held liable. City Administrator Joe Nichols stated that many truck drivers use GPS, which doesn’t follow truck routes. This has caused problems in the past with clipped power poles, traffic lights, fire hydrants, and even a diesel spill downtown. Clearly marking certain roads as not for through trucks will hopefully cut down on the problem.
We’ll have more from the meeting tomorrow.