CHEYENNE, Wyo. — A divisive city ordinance that would ban oversized vehicles is one step closer to becoming official. However, city councilmembers themselves are split on whether to pass it.
At Wednesday night’s Committee of the Whole meeting, councilmembers discussed the ordinance that will ban RVs, trailers and other large vehicles from parking on public streets for prolonged periods of time. A previous version of the ordinance passed its second reading at the Cheyenne City Council’s Nov. 25 meeting, garnering support from seven of nine councilmembers.
However, Councilmember Richard Johnson, who co-sponsored the ordinance, brought forward a substitute amendment at Wednesday’s meeting that proved to be more divisive. The substitute makes the following changes to the ordinance:
- Oversized vehicles will be allowed to park on public streets five days before Memorial Day to five days after Labor Day.
- A previous version of the ordinance would have allowed banned vehicles to be parked on public streets for 72 hours for the purposes of loading, unloading and winter preparation. In lieu of the 72-hour grace period, oversized vehicle owners would now be able to apply for a parking permit that grants them five days to park. The applications would be reviewed and granted by Cheyenne Police Chief Mark Francisco.
- Oversized vehicles will be cited and fined as a traffic violation before being towed.
- The ordinance would take effect in September to allow time for public education.
Johnson said he implemented these changes in response to input regarding enforcement. For instance, Francisco confirmed at the meeting that the 72-hour parking period could not realistically be enforced. The permitting process was included to accommodate hunters in the winter.
One change, however, has irked several councilmembers. Michelle Aldrich, a co-sponsor of the ordinance, shot down the proposed substitute Wednesday night as she believes the break from Memorial Day to Labor Day goes against the core philosophy of the ordinance, which is to bolster public safety.
“One of my reasons for helping to co-sponsor this was based on safety, and [summertime is] a time of year when a lot of children are out of school, playing in the streets, riding their bikes,” Aldrich said. “I don’t think [the substitute] addresses the safety issue, which is one of my biggest concerns.”
Aldrich also believes the ordinance should take effect sometime in spring instead of September, which is an excessive amount of wait time, she said.
Councilmember Pete Laybourn agreed. At past meetings, Laybourn has been a staunch opponent to the ordinance because it didn’t explain how the city could enforce such a ban. He was pleased to see a more refined process brought forward at Wednesday’s meeting. Despite this change, he doesn’t believe the ban sufficiently addresses public safety. He called the ban, as it is currently written, an “extremely convoluted and difficult-to-understand ordinance.”
“Summer … really is the essence of many people’s concerns about oversized vehicles,” Laybourn said. “So when more people are out and about, we’re not going to enforce it. … I speak against this substitute because it does not address the real concern here. The real concern here is the oversized vehicle that blocks the view of someone who is, for some reason, being in the street. … If that isn’t the essence of this entire effort, I can’t understand it.”
The City Council ultimately passed the substitute on a 5–3 vote, with Aldrich, Laybourn and Bryan Cook voting against. Councilmember Mark Rinne was not in attendance to vote. The ordinance will go for a third and final vote at the City Council’s next regular meeting Monday, Dec. 9.
A copy of the substituted ordinance and meeting livestream can be viewed below.
Arguments from the public
The proposed vehicle ban has received considerable support and opposition from residents over the past month.
Many residents showed up at the governing body’s meeting Nov. 25 to express their disapproval. Numerous people presented similar arguments as to why they don’t want the ordinance, stating that:
- It’s government overreach.
- There is a shortage of storage space. Additionally, when storage is available, it’s expensive. A monthly storage fee would also be especially burdensome to vehicle owners who are retired.
- Parts of the ordinance are ambiguous.
- Oversized vehicles don’t impede emergency vehicles and snowplows, as councilmembers have stated.
- The ordinance would adversely impact business owners and RV users.
- The rules are an indirect tax to residents, who already pay the city to maintain public streets.
At the same meeting, the council amended the ordinance to exempt oversized vehicles specific to disabled drivers from the ban.
Aside from these arguments, the city already has necessary safety measures but isn’t enforcing them, resident Alan Sheldon has argued at several city meetings. He has urged councilmembers to reject the ordinance and instead better enforce current city code stipulating where vehicles can or cannot park. According to city code, cars cannot park 30 feet or closer to street corners or 10 feet or closer to street centerlines.
“The proposed ordinance amounts to duplication of function in the city code and goes beyond that to create undue burden on the residents of Cheyenne who own these vehicles, as well as the police and code enforcement staff that will have to enforce it,” Sheldon said on Nov. 25.
Others have argued that the ordinance is unfair to residents and effectively serves as an additional tax.
“We don’t want to have to pay for storage,” Ward III resident Kathy Scigliano said at the Nov. 25 meeting. “We pay for taxes for our roads to be maintained. We’re paying vehicle registration.”
Members of the public in favor of the ban expressed their support at Wednesday’s Committee of the Whole meeting. Resident Paul Howard said he is surprised a vehicle ban isn’t already on the books. A trailer holding a boat near his home, he said, was left unattended for four years until it had to be moved for road maintenance.
“It was a nuisance to bike riders, it was a nuisance to drivers, and quite frankly, it was ugly as heck,” Howard said. “Since when do we have the right to use public property as our private parking area?”
Another resident said she has witnessed near-crash incidents due to oversized vehicles creating blind spots. If the ordinance doesn’t pass, then she believes the city is “giving residents a gift.”
“Cheyenne is a liberal outlier on this issue,” she said. “Our street often looks like a used auto shop with all the trailers, ATVs, junk cars and modified delivery trucks. In the end, it really comes down to common sense and being courteous to your neighbors.”
Resident and attorney Abigail Boudewyns has been an ardent supporter of the ban at several meetings, despite being an RV owner herself. She addressed concerns that the ordinance was government overreach and noted that the cities of Gillette, Rock Springs, Douglas and Powell outlaw parking oversized vehicles on public roadways.
“It is a safety issue,” Boudewyns said at Wednesday’s meeting. “You see them everywhere, and you see the ones that never move.”
Council’s reasoning for the ban
Members of the City Council discussed at length at the Nov. 25 meeting why the ordinance is being proposed in the first place.
Councilmember Richard Johnson has said constituents constantly tell him about oversized vehicles and how they are a hazard to public safety.
“This [issue] is brought up a lot,” Johnson said at the Nov. 25 council meeting. “That’s why I brought it forward. These are instances that are not reported. … Yes, is it a disenfranchisement to all of you to have to pay for these storages, but another individual brought it up to me and said, ‘Well, Richard, aren’t we technically subsidizing them to allow them to park for free on our city street?’ which is a very interesting principle when you think about it.”
Michelle Aldrich similarly said the majority of people she hears from tell her that oversized vehicles are a safety hazard.
Tom Segrave said he is most concerned about vehicles that never move, making it hard for sanitation trucks and snowplows to navigate.
“I know there’s one boat on Powderhouse Road that hasn’t moved in years,” Segrave said. “How is that fair to all the neighbors and the other people who want to park on the public street? It’s not fair, it’s not right. So that’s what’s got my attention more so than the vehicle that comes and goes.”
Mark Rinne said that streets are a public infrastructure, which doesn’t give residents the right to use them for personal storage.
