By MIKE HELM

A moratorium on the placement of manufactured homes in subdivisions was lifted Tuesday night when commissioners unanimously voted to suspend a portion of a county ordinance that new County Planner Stevie Cox interpreted in a way that required roads to be paved to N.C. Department of Transportation (DOT) standards for paved roads.

Paving roads to DOT standards costs $365,000 per mile and Cox’s interpretation of the ordinance effectively put a moratorium on the placement of mobile and modular homes in subdivisions and prevented landowners from further developing their mobile and modular home parks. The cost of paving the roads would be passed on to the land buyers.

Cox was making a strict interpretation of the ordinance, which says that roads should be maintained to DOT standards. The problem was, as Commissioner David Dutton discovered, DOT only has standards for paved roads.

The Columbus County Planning Board met for the first time as a board of adjustments last month to hear a request for a variance from the ordinance from a family that had been burned out of their house and was trying to close on property in a subdivision.

The planning board didn’t grant a variance but said that in the case in question the road should be all weather, covered with crush and run, marl or some other surface, as has been standard practice in the county since the ordinance was adopted in 1998. The board required the landowner to purchase a performance bond to assure the work would be completed properly.

Tuesday night, County Commissioner David Dutton made a motion to suspend the portion of the ordinance that requires paved roads until it can be rewritten and instead require roads that meet the standards the planning board defined in the variance hearing. The motion passed unanimously.

Commissioners moved quickly to address the problem, which had serious financial consequences for manufactured home sellers and landowners. Columbus County averages more than 400 permits each year for mobile and modular homes, compared to just 35 for site-built homes.

North Carolina law allows the Board of Commissioners to suspend enforcement of an ordinance indefinitely without a public hearing. Dutton said the temporary suspension would give the planning board time to rewrite the ordinance.

The commissioner’s action to suspend the ordinance Tuesday night was motivated by a perception that the county planning board and planner were not moving fast enough to address the problem, according to a source. One planning board member said he was concerned that he would be asked to drive to Whiteville every week to hear numerous boards of adjustments cases.

The ordinance was written with the intent of having roads good enough to allow access by emergency vehicles. Dutton, who was on the board of commissioners that passed the ordinance, said paved roads were never intended. Whiteville Mayor Dial Gray, who attended the county board meting, was also a commissioner when the ordinance passed. Gray confirmed, when asked by Dutton, that the board wasn’t requiring paved roads.

He said the board adopted an ordinance that was supposed to be modified by the then-county administrator. However, the changes were not made and the ordinance never came back before the board, Gray said.

Former County Manager Billy Joe Farmer said he interpreted the ordinance as requiring four inches of gravel or marl or a similar all weather surface but not paved roads.

Dutton said the suspension would give the planner and planning board time to rewrite the ordinance and end the current problem.