Trending
ELKINS -- Elkins City Council will vote once again tonight on allowing ATVs and UTVs on the city's streets.
The agenda for tonight's meeting includes the first of two readings of an updated ordinance that would allow the operation of street-legal special purpose vehicles on city streets.
The initial version of the ATV ordinance deadlocked Elkins City Council late last year.
Council voted 6-4 in early December to send back to the Rules and Ordinance Committee for review the controversial proposed ordinance. The ordinance had been set for a vote on its second and final reading at that council meeting.
On Nov. 19, Elkins Mayor Van Broughton broke a 5-5 tie by casting his vote to approve on first reading the proposed ordinance. The tie vote came after a lengthy and at time contentious discussion on the ATV ordinance by council members, as well as a motion to send the ordinance back to the committee to be revised -- that vote also resulted in a 5-5 tie.
Matt Ogden, an Elkins Fire Department firefighter, first alerted council that the state had passed a new law allowing insured, inspected and registered ATVs and UTVs on state roads other than interstates, divided highways and roads with a speed limit greater than 55 mph.
Ogden told council members in November that the only roads surrounding Elkins that the vehicles are not allowed on is the Corridor H section of Route 33.
Also in November, Elkins Police Chief Travis Bennett urged council to pass the ATV ordinance, saying, "If this isn't passed, it's not going to eliminate ATVs in Elkins ... Randolph Avenue, Harrison Avenue and 11th Street are state roads. State roads, state rules. We can't keep them off of it."
Several council members, along with a number of residents speaking during the public comment sections of the meetings, said they were concerned about the noise created by ATVs being driven in residential neighborhoods, and about safety issues regarding the vehicles.
Elkins City Council will meet virtually at 7 p.m. tonight via the Zoom platform. Login information is available at cityofelkinswv.com.