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City strengthens cell phone ban
By Chris Strunk
Last Updated: June 16, 2010

If the ordinance receives final approval in July, Valley Center police will have the authority to pull your car over and ticket you for talking or texting on a cell phone while driving.

The Valley Center City Council is poised to pass an ordinance that would completely ban the use of cell phones while driving (hand-held or hands-free). Further, the law to which the council gave first-round approval during its June 15 meeting would make it a primary traffic offense.

“It's a safety issue," said council member Harry Gerling. “We've got to drop the plow in the ground sometime and get this thing going."

The ordinance passed 5-2 and will receive a final vote during the council's July 6 meeting. Kate Jackson, Bruce Campbell, Lou Cicirello, Gerling and Al Hobson voted for the ordinance. Jake Jackson and Marci Maschino voted against it. Cheryl Nordstedt was not at the meeting.

“If we're going to do something, let's do something that is courageous," Campbell said.

The council had previously considered an ordinance that would have banned the use of hand-held cell phones while driving, but stopped short of making it a primary offense. The previous ordinance would have allowed drivers to use hands-free phones.

Campbell read an insurance industry report that said that states with hand-held cell phone bans had just as many accident claims as those without them. He said he would support an ordinance that bans all cell phone use.

Maschino said taking the ordinance a step further could win her support. She said the original ordinance was duplicative with the city's inattentive driving law. However, she voted against the more restrictive ordinance because she wanted city staff to re-write the law with the changes that were suggested and bring it back to the council for consideration.

Jake Jackson said the law was too intrusive.

“We need to have the intestinal fortitude to do this," Hobson said, suggesting that other cities may be watching to see whether Valley Center would follow through with the ordinance.

If the ordinance wins final approval next month, the ban would go into effect soon after it is published.

In other business June 15, the council:

•Declared the dilapidated garage on the north side of Fourth Street east of the intersection with Park Street to be a hazardous structure and ordered it to be razed. City staff said the garage and the adjacent house were inspected by county officials, and the garage was determined to be unsafe. The council stopped short of ordering the house demolished. Instead, it set a public hearing for Aug. 3 to give the property owner — a Florida-based mortgage company — a chance to respond to the city. The house is more than 120 years old and hasn't been lived in since November. The city boarded up doors and windows to keep people out of it.

•Recognized local businesses Retro-Systems LLC and All Saints Homecare Inc. by reading a letter from Gov. Mark Parkinson that declared them Kansas Department of Commerce Business Merit Award winners.

•Heard Fourth District county commission hopeful Richard Ranzau introduce himself as a candidate.

•Approved an ordinance that updates the city's dangerous structures procedures.

•Approved a bid of $20,862 from Mies Construction to install a sewer line extension to serve three properties in the city's industrial park.

•Learned that work to reconstruct the Ford Street bridge could begin in September.

•Learned the city is looking into possible solutions to stormwater drainage issues north of the Windmill Valley subdivision on the north side of the city. The city received several complaints from the area during the most recent rainstorms.

•Approved a request from LifePoint Church to use part of Lions Park for its annual Marketplace vacation Bible school July 17 through 23.





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