Council should stand by city’s rules with Ingles
Tomorrow [March 22, 2011] City Council has a chance to prove why government matters. You can show the doubters on both right and left that the city of Asheville’s regulatory function is neither burdensome to the free market nor corrupted by special interests. Good government acts as a referee to ensure that the rules are applied fairly to all — no matter how wealthy, no matter how popular they may be.
Ingles has wisely agreed to abide by the city’s rules concerning parking-lot landscaping and pedestrian access at both Smoky Park Highway and Brevard Road. But the company still wants to install lights that are far brighter, and signs that are much larger and more numerous, than city ordinances allow — and, as city staff reports show, considerably brighter and bigger than the lights and signs of their law-abiding competitors.
No one can question the admirable legacy of generosity to Asheville that Bob Ingle Sr. left with his passing, both in contributing to charity and in creating local jobs. But it would tarnish that legacy for Council to treat it as though it implied a trade-off for special favors that aren’t granted to other, less influential businesses.
It would be both unfair and unsafe to grant Ingles a 400% increase in lighting over what the UDO allows for its fuel canopies. City staff’s lighting study shows other, competing gas stations are operating in compliance with our light-pollution ordinance (which is based on national standards). Those canopies are already extremely bright: Consider the dangerous night-blindness the lighting level requested by Ingles would induce in motorists.
It would also be unfair for Council to continue granting Ingles exceptions to our sign ordinance. Many small businesses already complain about imbalanced enforcement of the ordinance — remember how much flak the city caught for cracking down on Picnics’ chicken man? There’s a lot of resentment surrounding sidewalk-sign enforcement, too, as I’m sure you’re aware.
Consider how much more anger and disgust Council and staff will justifiably be subjected to if Council is seen to suspend the sign rules for Ingles while enforcing them on everyone else.
Stand fast by our city’s rules. Be the fair and consistent referee that Asheville’s businesses and residents want city government to be, to keep the playing field even for all. If Ingles feels that these rules are unfairly restrictive, then they should have come and sat at the table with the other stakeholders when these ordinances were drafted. They can still follow the proper process for requesting that the city consider amending the UDO — but for all players, not just for Ingles.
— Steve Rasmussen
FOR MORE INFO: Coalition of Asheville Neighborhoods Wiki at http://174.129.0.226/Issues/Conditional_Zoning/CZ_Ingles_Smoky_Park_Hwy