Race cars hot topic at city meeting
Monday night?s Onaway City Commission meeting brought a considerable number of people to voice their opinions for and against race cars being stored in yards within the city limits. Stock and bump-and-run vehicles fall under the city?s junk car ordinance.
The city?s definition of a junk vehicleis as follows: ?A disabled motor vehicle is defined–… as a motor vehicle which is dismantled, in whole or in part, and/or which is mechanically unable to operate as the result of a mechanical defect or malfunction.
?The absence of minor and non-essential parts such as antennas, or ornaments, hub caps, etc., shall not cause a vehicle to be deemed dismantled and thereby disabled. Any vehicle which is not currently licensed or is not capable of being licensed for operation on the rights of way of the streets, alleys or highways of the city shall be deemed disabled.
?An unlicensed vehicle or vehicle which is mechanically unable to operate is permitted to be stored in the commercially zoned areas of the city where the property owner operates a licensed auto repair shop and the property has all zoning approvals necessary.?
IN ENFORCING the junk car ordinance city manager Joe Hefele had chosen not to cite the owners of stock and bump-and-run cars during the racing season. According to Hefele, after the racing season the drivers for these vehicles who live in town have either junked these vehicles or stored them somewhere. ?I do not recall a situation where cars were left in someone?s back yard in the past,? said Hefele. Randy Stevens received a ticket recently from Hefele. Stevens had four unlicensed vehicles in his back yard, three of which were racing cars. Two have since been removed according to Hefele, and Stevens said he will be removing another one soon. The last vehicle, according to Stevens, was placed on a licensed trailer and trapped for the winter, still in his yard. Hefele said, ?In this one particular case, I think the car on the trailer is okay, while the other must be moved.?
Hefele asked the commissioners if one race car on a trailer is acceptable. ?In my opinion, yes. Is any type of car, racing or not, with a tarp over it in a back yard acceptable? In my opinion, no,? said Hefele.
HEFELE BELIEVES if commissioners allow cars with tarps it will be creating a very big problem for him in enforcing the ordinance. ?It will be even more difficult to tell what?s what,? he said. ?Already, people are backing cars tight into buildings so I can?t see whether they are plated or not. The only way I can handle that is to wait to see if a car stays in one place without moving for a period of time.? ?I did have about six cars on my property,? Stevens said. ?I was stripping them, getting parts. Those parts don?t come free, but if you get those parts free, you strip them and use them and get rid of the rest. That?s basically what I did,? said Stevens.
?My buddy here, Anthony Splan, has a car across the street. Every so often we push the car across the street to my house to weld on it. I have a welder. I?ll weld on his car for an hour or two and push his car back across the street into his garage. I don?t really see the harm in that,? said Stevens.
STEVENS EXPLAINED that he understands his neighbor?s (Bev Chubb) and his other neighbor?s concerns, one of whom has their home up for sale. He said he?s not a rich man and that stock car racing is a hobby. ?You talk about stock cars, on the same token, I walked through town the other day from my house on Second Street to the trailer park, I counted 27 cars untagged. I knocked on three doors and none of them got a ticket. ?If we?re going to write tickets let?s go all around town and get everybody. Don?t just single out just me, that seems very unfair.?
Hefele explained he has written letters to the owners, with most of them working with him to solve the problem, and that he has written tickets if there were several vehicles, more than one. ?What I?d like to know is why these ordinances aren?t enforced,? said Bev Chubb. ?There?s an attempt to enforce them. Joe doesn?t have all day to do that every day, he does do other things here,? said mayor Gary Wregglesworth. ?I happen to live next to this gentleman, (Stevens) and it?s been going on for months,? said Chubb.
?We have to come to some kind of agreement,? said Stevens. We are neighbors, we have to live next to each other. I cleaned up my yard the other day. I?ve done everything to appease the lady. I don?t have to get along with her, but I do have to follow laws. My question is, can I have one stock car on a trailer, trapped?? ?Well that?s opening up a bag of worms then,? said Chubb. Wregglesworth said he didn?t see one vehicle on a trailer a problem.
?THE BOTTOM LINE is that we need to sit down soon, during a special workshop meeting, and go over our existing ordinances, and what can be done to strengthen them, and what new ordinances might be helpful,? said Hefele. ?What some of you people don?t realize, the city manager kind of bent over backwards and let the racing cars go because it is an important part of the community,? said commissioner Bernie Schmeltzer. Nothing was decided on the issue of
?Why don?t we just make it for that property. Every time we turn around we?re doing this,? said Wregglesworth.