It was standing room only at a lengthy Nicholas County Commission meeting this week that focused on property ordinances. Eyewitness News said hundreds of people came to make their feelings known about two ordinances that the Nicholas County Commission put forward that would have given the county commission a process to regulate and enforce properties deemed unsafe or unsanitary. Right now, towns and cities have the ability to do this but not the county without ordinances on the books.
Most who spoke either wanted the proposed ordinance reworded or abandoned all together arguing it would be government overreach. Commissioners assured the people that they would all be voting no on this measure. Commissioners told those in attendance that they were approached by the New River Gorge Regional Development Authority to put a safe structures ordinance and land use agency ordinance on the books in an effort to help tear down dilapidated, abandoned structures.