Local Vehicle Regulations


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Posted by Paul Cook in Kempner, TX on Wednesday, January 14, 2009 at 16:04:12 :

Why is no one addressing the real issue?

Every time this issue has come up on any of these Forums, there are posts that bad mouth neighbors, local politicians, local government bodies, state laws, liberals, conservatives, tall people, short people, and about any other identifiable entity.

My son started collecting 1940’s two-wheel-drive Dodge pickups in the early 1980’s. We had two WC’s and a WD-15. We bought a 1950 Plymouth car to use its motor for one of the trucks. My son - who had just gotten his drivers license - shifted his focus to the readily available car. This left us with three trucks on our city lot. To comply with a city ordinance, I expanded our rear patio and enclosed it with a privacy fence. Then, we bought a 1950 Dodge car, again planning to use its motor. The boys and I were all into competitive off-road motorcycling and the bikes and their trailer used up all the garage space. The Dodge had to sit in our driveway in violation of the ordinance which the city was very zealous in enforcing.

I spotted a house with a three-car garage in the country. There’s nothing like those three garage doors to get a motor head’s attention. Plus, it was on nine acres of county land that was minimally regulated. We bought the place and moved to the country.

In a few years, the city I moved out of started actions to annex our area. If that happened, very few things would be “grandfathered” so our old vehicles were possibly going back on the city’s radar. I joined a group that worked to have our little community incorporated. There was a lot of support because many ways of life would be affected if we were annexed by the other city. Our community was one of large yards - 5 to 25 acres - where people pursued many different hobbies. Our high school had a very active FFA and a lot of the students raised livestock for agricultural classes. Other folks had large storage buildings for RV’s and boats. There were several Model A Ford collectors with parts vehicles on their land - and one old Power Wagon guy.

The rural community of Kempner became the incorporated City of Kempner, Texas. As an active member of the group that worked to get our city incorporated, I was clearly in no position to decline when some of my neighbors asked me to serve on our newly created City Council.

Being involved in this way gave me great insight into the establishment of all those City Ordinances. In many states, there are various classes of cities. In Texas, cities are classified as either "general law" or "home rule". A city may elect home rule status once it exceeds 5,000 population and the voters agree to home rule and vote to be governed by a City Charter.

Otherwise, it is classified as general law and has very limited powers. However, a general law city has many requirements specified by state law. General law cities must enact ordinances which specify how the city and its residents meet these requirements.

For example, there are “health and safety” requirements to protect the residents. Typically these mandate the rules for being a good neighbor. Among the “health and safety” ordinances are pages and pages of regulations that say what our mothers meant they said, “Clean up your room.” But because many of our neighbors are “bad children” who grew up into “bad adults”, the city has to be “Mother” to them. Instead of “grounding” them, the city has to license them, fine them, and sometimes prosecute and convict them.

Just as “Mother” was sometimes a bit overbearing, cities also get carried away and overdo these responsibilities. And as happens when the town spinster who has no children is asked to control the children, we end up with people setting the rules who have no knowledge of the subject.

At first, we adopted ordinances supplied by our City Attorney. These were almost “generic” in nature and were very similar in content to those of other similar cities. Soon, we learned to write our own ordinances which were more appropriate to our situation and needs. In most cases, they were shorter and had fewer “whereas” paragraphs.

During our incorporation efforts, I described myself as a “political refugee” fleeing the oppression of the city that wanted to annex our community and threaten my vehicle collecting activities. As a “political refugee” I had done extensive research on the Texas State Transportation Code (TSTC). I learned the state made provisions for vehicle collectors but these provisions were seldom carried down to most city ordinances. I also learned that the higher authority of the TSTC also had definitions that were in conflict. One of these concerned the use of the term, “junk vehicle”. The TSTC defined “wrecking and salvage yards” as places where vehicle parts were removed for reuse in other vehicles. “Junk yards” were places where the basic materials were recovered. This meant that an engine block that was to be reused to power a vehicle was handled at a wrecking and salvage yard, but an engine block that was so many pounds of cast iron headed for the smelter was processed at a junk yard. That meant it was no longer identifiable as an engine block. Yet the TSTC referred to “junk cars”. When you apply both definitions, there cannot be such a thing.

There were other contradictions. Texas was the home of Lady Bird Johnson. Even after the passing of LBJ, Lady Bird had considerable influence. One of her accomplishments was legislation for the beautification of interstate highways. This limited bill boards and required screening of unsightly places such as wrecking and salvage yards, and junk yards. As often happens, some legislators took advantage of the momentum that Lady Bird’s influence created and increased the scope of the legislation. Instead of “interstates” the wording became “major roads” which could be interpreted as almost everything that was not a private driveway. A lot of money was spent building solid fencing to screen things from view.

Definitions already in use provided reduced screening requirements for vehicle collectors. Collectors included those who owned antique vehicles and special interest vehicles. In Texas, a “special interest” vehicle is a vehicle of any age that is owned by a collector and maintained for its historical significance.

I had 30 years of experience interpreting government regulations and inspecting various activities for their compliance. Often, this entailed writing subordinate regulations that addressed specific circumstances unique to a particular activity. With this background, I was asked to write some of our city ordinances. We had to be in compliance with the Texas Municipal Code, but we were free to clarify definitions and contradictory language. So guess who wrote our city ordinance concerning old cars.

Most of the issues brought up by those Forum visitors who are complaining about their local regulations seem to center around a difference in terminology. The way to deal with this is to bring all those who share your concerns together. Do your homework. Find out where a particular requirement originated. Is it a local thing pushed into law by the town’s old grump who did not like anything? Or is it a misinterpretation of a state law? Identify all the ambiguous terms. Prepare a draft changing the portions of the regulations that your group would like to have changed. Find a knowledgeable local official and ask him or her to support changing the local regulation. You may find that there are members of your community who have no interest in your vehicles but feel that there are other regulations which have similar unpopular requirements. You can enlist their support for getting these local regulations updated. And when all else fails, there will be an election sooner or later that will get the attention of the people who are not responsive.

Instead of complaining on the Forum, invest that time and effort in making things better where you are.




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