Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, June 3, 1990                   TAG: 9006040198
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: D-2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

CONSOLIDATION

The latest wrinkle is annexation - whether, how and for what price Salem, if consolidation is approved, might be able to take over some of what's now the county. Never mind that Salem was a voluntary non-participant in the city-county negotiations that led to the merger plan that is to be voted on in November.

A few words of annexation explanation seem in order. Let's start with things as they now stand:

First, municipalities can annex parts only of adjacent counties, and not of cities. Presumably, without special dispensation, neither Salem nor anyone else could annex territory of the new metropolitan government, whose proposed charter grants it all the powers of both the city and the county.

Second, Roanoke County is immune from annexation by either Roanoke City or Salem. This is by state law enacted in 1979.

Third, under the same law the county is not immune from annexation by Vinton, which is a town that's part of the county and not an independent city like Roanoke or Salem.

If nothing more is done and the merger vote fails, all this would continue to be the case.

Thus, the merger plan, in providing for annexation by Vinton, gives to the town no power that it does not currently possess. Rather, the provision would keep this part of the status quo in effect even if the merger is approved.

Why, though, this business about seeking from Salem a 25-year agreement not to annex? If Salem can't annex now, and couldn't annex if the merger is approved, what's going on?

One part of the answer is that the current law contains an exemption. The county is not immune to - though it can fight in court - citizen-initiated annexations.

Sometimes, as in the recent Red Lane annexation case, the distinction between city-initiated and citizen-initiated annexations can be fuzzy.

The second part of the answer is politics. By giving residents of west county an opportunity to join Salem if the merger is approved, it was reasoned, consolidation might be more popular with the voters there.

The result was an offer - and something of a dare - to Salem.

If the merger is approved, Salem was told, it could annex much of west county (subject to a second vote by residents there) for a price considerably less than how it normally would be calculated.

In return, however, Salem would have to agree beforehand not to accept citizen-initiated annexations in the event the merger is not approved.

It is this offer/dare that Salem City Council is reluctant to accept.

To some Roanoke Valley residents, all this may be evidence enough that consolidation is a tangled web to be avoided.

In fact, it confirms how archaic and baroque is the complexity of local government in the valley, and how desperate is the need to simplify it via consolidation.