Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, April 4, 1990 TAG: 9004040496
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MARK LAYMAN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
So he drafted two petitions - one in favor of becoming part of Vinton, one against - and started knocking on doors in the Lindenwood subdivision.
The results were "staggering," he said recently, so he went on to Montgomery Village, Falling Creek and other subdivisions along Virginia 24 and Hardy Road.
By last week, he had talked to 1,532 residents, and 97 percent of them had signed the petition saying they did not want to become part of the town. "I'm surprised myself," he said.
He has given copies of the petitions to the circuit courts in Roanoke and Roanoke County, Vinton Town Council and the Roanoke County Board of Supervisors.
The chairman of the county board, Dick Robers, is using the petitions in an effort to persuade Roanoke City Council to allow east county residents to vote on whether to become part of Vinton if the governments consolidate. As it stands now, the consolidation agreement allows the town to expand its boundary without a vote by those residents.
The petitions are "something we should seriously consider," Robers said.
Supervisor Harry Nickens, who represents Vinton and east Roanoke County, voted against that and other proposed changes in the agreement. That puzzles Stewart, who told the Board of Supervisors last week that he was "keenly disappointed" in Nickens.
Nickens, who was one of the county's consolidation negotiators, has no hard feelings toward Stewart. "He has approached this in a most responsible fashion," Nickens said.
But for now at least, Nickens is keeping his opinion of the consolidation agreement to himself. And he wouldn't disclose why the negotiators agreed to let Vinton expand its boundary without a vote by east Roanoke County residents.
He did say, though, that balancing the sometimes-conflicting interests of Vinton and east Roanoke County residents can be "very trying."
Many residents of the Falling Creek subdivision signed a petition last fall asking Vinton to annex them. The residents were unhappy with law enforcement and their subdivision's water supply, among other things.
The town seriously considered that request but did not take action after the Board of Supervisors warned that it would fight any annexation attempt at that time.
The county also assured Vinton that if the Grayson Commission's proposed restrictions on town annexations were approved by the General Assembly this year, it still could annex under the old law. That ceased to be a problem after the legislature delayed action for a year on the package of legislation proposed by the commission, which looked at ways to streamline local governments.
In the meantime, Nickens said, the county has tried to take care of the problems cited by Falling Creek residents. The new county police department will take over law enforcement responsibilities from the Sheriff's Department this summer. The county also is trying to work out an expanded law enforcement mutual aid agreement with the town.
And the county has purchased the private water system that serves the subdivision. The town will take over the water system as soon as details are worked out, Nickens said.
As a result, he said, some Falling Creek residents who signed the petition asking to be annexed by Vinton last fall apparently had changed their minds by the time Stewart came around with his petitions.
Stewart admitted that his own strong opinion might have influenced the residents he talked to, but said he did not have to twist any arms.
Many of those who signed his petitions do not want to pay higher taxes in the town, Stewart said. Vinton adds 6 cents to Roanoke County's real estate tax rate of $1.15 per $100 of assessed value. That's likely to be lowered to 5 cents in the 1990-1991 budget year, in keeping with a trend that began in the early 1980s, Vinton Mayor Charles Hill said.
After consolidation, residents of Vinton would pay taxes to the town and to the Roanoke Metropolitan Government.
There was another comment about the town he heard often, Stewart said: "I've lived there before, and I don't want to go back."
But most of all, people want a choice, he said.
"I have nothing against the town," Stewart said. In fact, he and Hill were boyhood friends. "But I don't even agree with my wife on everything."
Hill declined to comment on Stewart's petitions. Town Council might make a statement about the petitions later, he said.
Stewart, a lifelong resident of the Roanoke Valley, worked for the Norfolk and Western Railway 37 years before a heart condition and other health problems forced him to go on disability.
He calls himself "just a regular guy" who "saw something being rammed down our throats. . . . And I felt strongly enough about it that I tried to do something."
Going door-to-door over the past six weeks was great exercise and a great way to get to know his neighbors in east Roanoke County, he said. "I've met so many nice people. . . . Practically everybody invited me into their homes."
It even got him thinking about running for public office someday, he said.
by CNB