Palm Coast government is moving toward relaxing prohibitions on commercial vehicles parked in residential driveways while still maintaining relatively strict regulations.
In sum, small work trucks and vans typically used for services such as air conditioning, painting, pest control, plumbing and the like will be allowed to park in driveways, uncovered. So will trucks with racks, as long as the racks are modest and part of the truck’s tools. Only one truck would be allowed in a driveway.
Vehicles within the allowable size and passenger vehicles with commercial messages will also be allowed to keep their messages uncovered. Those messages will not be policed.
Larger commercial vehicles, including box trucks like dry cleaning vehicles, passenger vans, small and large trailer trucks, actual trailers of any kind, limousines or taxis, and of course dump trucks or larger commercial vehicles will continue to be prohibited.
Based on a discussion at Tuesday’s Palm Coast City Council workshop, the proposed measure, which would be up for a vote later this month or early in October, has the support of Mayor Mike Norris and council members Ty Miller and Theresa Pontieri. The initiative was originally proposed by Pontieri. Council member Dave Sullivan said he will oppose the measure no matter what. Council member Charles Gambaro was skeptical about the proposal but did not show his hand.
“This is a good middle ground here. This has been kind of an issue for a very long time,” Miller said. “It’s not allowing these large vehicles in driveways, but it is allowing kind of the working class to do their job and go home.”
There is also a benefit to the Code Enforcement division: commercial vehicle enforcement and swale parking enforcement are among the division’s top offenses. Not having to cite for a certain class of commercial vehicles would lighten code enforcement’s workload.
“How much will this change of complexity or the look of the city of Palm Coast?” Gambaro asked. “It’s not what happens here in the next year or two. How does the city of Palm Coast look 20 years from now?”
Gambaro was also curious about loosening language allowances. “Just for example. Let’s say Ty Miller was announcing that he had a strip club business, and parked that van next to me, let’s use it as an example, with whatever vulgarities or whatever, that would be allowed?” Gambaro asked.
“That’s correct,” Code Enforcement Manager Barbara Grossman said. “I cannot read the content. That’s per the Supreme Court,” Grossman said.
“Not that Ty would run that kind of a business,” Gambaro said. (He does not.)
The concern may be overstated: the city currently does not police the signs on anyone’s property. Those signs are not restricted to politics, nor to political seasons. Anyone can put a sign, commercial, political, ideological, religious or otherwise on a front lawn, facing the public right of way. The content may not be restricted by the city. The only thing the city may regulate is the location of the sign, the number of signs, and the size of the signs. The freedom has not provoked a rash of unseemly abuses.
The proposed allowance for “ladders or other attachments which do not exceed the height of the highest point on the vehicle by more than two feet or does not exceed the length of the vehicle’s length by more than two feet” drew the most concern, even from Pontieri. “This is more than I had bargained for when I suggested we relook at this code,” she said.
“If we allow vehicles that have a lot of things piled on top of them, we are going to see more swell parking,” Pontieri said. “I would get rid of these exceptions.” She has no problem with ladders. But she does with “other attachments,” especially if materials can be piled for up to 2 feet. And a line about attachments having to be “kept in a neat, clean and well-kept manner” worries her for its subjectivity. One worker’s neatness can be an OCD-addled neighbor’s abomination.
To Miller, the allowance is not for extraneous materials that would not be on the truck as it is driven, in compliance with road rules, around town.
Alternately, Pontieri said, commercial vehicles could be cited when in swales. “ I don’t want to not be business friendly. Obviously, that’s why I asked for us to readdress this code,” she said, “but I do feel that business owners need to be responsible for the way their employees, I guess, behave when they’re driving their businesses’ vehicles.”
Citations will go to the owner of the vehicle–the bearer of its registration–and not necessarily to its driver.
City Attorney Marcus Duffy cautioned: “I’m not going to be able to have language that doesn’t catch all.” And Sullivan will not change his mind: “I’ve thought about this a lot, and I’m not going to be in favor of any changes to the current regulation, no matter what,” he said. “I think it’s going to be too hard. You’re going to create a new code that will force just as many problems into the future, because people will be pushing the limits of whatever code we come up with,” Sullivan said.
Curiously, the item drew only two public comments. In the past, the proposal has drawn public reactions in droves, with passion on both sides. But as with the relaxing of outside paint colors, the longer the matter was discussed, the lesser the public response. That may yet change when the council votes on the proposal’s first reading.
john stove says
Stupid Stupid Stupid
Now we will have trucks with ladders and lumber hanging all over the rack and we will be calling Code Enforcement to measure the height of the stacked material.
Then, Mr. Plumber/Roofer/AC guy will decide to do some advance work in his/her driveway and pull some material off the truck and saw/weld or put together the items in the driveway, so basically a work area….again calling Code Enforcement.
Also, if you park your work truck in your driveway in Palm Coast and you come to work on my house in Palm Coast you better not even think of charging me a “Travel Fee” as you basically are in the same area.
DC says
According to the code, a 1.5 ton pickup truck is a commercial vehicle.
Mr. Reddington says
This would be a fair outcome to all.
Considering that many people are trades and commonly drive their work truck as their other vehicle.
Under no circumstances should a trailer or commercial vehicle be allowed like the ones in the not allowed pictures.
Good job City Council!
Deborah Coffey says
Just what we need. In Toscana, we’ve got a newly painted bright ORANGE house. This is a lesson on how to devalue neighborhoods. What else can they do to cause us to lose our investments in our homes? Chickens?
Kevin says
Glad I live in an HOA, where none of this will be allowed.
Long-time resident says
There was a time, not too long ago, when Palm Coast was a community of the affluent. It was a very nice upscale community with 2 swimming pools: Belle Terre Swim & Racquet Club and Freida Zamba. Not only that, there were tennis courts where the likes of Andre Agassi came to play. The retirees moving here for the most part had money from retirement savings plus government pensions. It was a very happy community. It was upscale in every sense of the word. (What’s wrong with that?)
Now we have a Palm Coast City Council lead by Mike Norris, Theresa Pontiere, and the very weak personality, Ty Miller. These 3 are determined to speak to the masses of lower middle class residents who come to Palm Coast with no avenue for gainful employment and therefore have to start a “business” to survive financially. These are the people crying about the lack of affordable housing. These are the people crying about there being “no jobs”. These are the people crying nonstop about taxes. These are the people crying about the price of food.
Why any elected person would want to cater to people who can’t afford to live here is beyond me.
Why any elected person would want to take the City of Palm Coast from an affluent thriving community down into a place with garishly painted houses and work trucks parked in residential driveways is beyond me, I don’t know of any living entity that strives to continually go backwards and go lower. Except Palm Coast.
I don’t know anyone who consciously strives to go backwards into a lower socioeconomic class, yet this is exactly what this current city council is doing. First, its giving almost free reign to house colors (with a few caveats), now it’s parking all kinds of work vehicles in residential driveways. Usually trucks backed into the driveway. Do you think it’s going to end with this? No. Then the incessant loudmouths will want to park their boats in their driveways. Then it’ll be bigger work trucks and RVs. The loudmouths always win.
I’ve never experienced a town being in such a rush to destroy itself.
Think about this when it comes time to vote for Pontieri as she tries to move up the political ladder into county politics.
Here’s my warning: Sooner rather than later the affluent who remain here will get sick and tired of their neighborhoods being destroyed by turquoise, black, purple houses next-door to them with work trucks backed into driveways and masses of rentals with unkempt yards. Then all that’ll be left is the lower middle class who won’t be able to afford to live here and who won’t be able to afford the taxes to keep the community going.
All you have to do is drive down to Port Orange to see what’s happened to that community. If you’ve ever taken a sociology or psychology course in college, it’s inevitable that the people with money will end up moving out and the only people left are renters and people who can’t afford to leave. Just like every other place, it’ll become a cesspool of rentals and unkempt properties along with the never ending loudmouth complainers who always seem to get their way.
I feel sorrow for Palm Coast because it didn’t have to end up this way.
I’m ashamed I ever ascribed to being a Republican. I’m ashamed I ever belonged to the Flagler County Republican Executive Committee.
JC says
Long-time resident statement to me reads NIMBY 100% and is anti-working class folks. Gotcha