UTV ordinance to go into effect Jan. 1

FORUM FILE PHOTO

MARYVILLE, Mo. — After months of discussion, the Maryville City Council on Monday voted to legalize the use of utility vehicles on city streets.

During Monday’s regular meeting, council members present voted 3-1 to approve the code changes, which also allows golf carts. The ordinance goes into effect Jan. 1.

Generally, anyone with a valid driver’s license and a city permit will be able to operate a UTV on city streets with posted speed limits of 35 mph or lower. UTVs will continue to be prohibited on state and federal highways, though, even if it has a lower speed limit, like some stretches of First and Main streets.

The council last discussed the issue on Oct. 12, when city staff went back to the drawing board to address some council concerns. In the finalized language, the fee for UTV permits was reduced to $25 and provisions having to do with modifications, ride height and time-of-day restrictions were removed.

City Manager Ryan Heiland had initially proposed that permit fees be set at $250 to help keep numbers manageable and to help pay for the police department having to perform safety inspections for each permit. On Monday, Heiland said the finalized $25 fee would be palatable because the ordinance now allows the city to assign inspections to third parties, like vehicle repair shops that already perform motor vehicle inspections.

“And so, if anybody’s wanting to get a UTV permit, they can take their UTV and their inspection form, and they can go to one of these third-party places,” Heiland said. “They can get an inspection (in) probably 30 minutes or less — a lot quicker than what we could do.”

Permits will run for a year, from Jan. 1 to Dec. 31, and will need to be renewed annually.

Golf carts will also be allowed to operate on some city streets, but with more restrictions. The ordinance will allow golf carts only during daylight hours and only on city streets with speed limits of 25 mph or lower.

The measure approved Monday included no special provisions that would allow golf carts to travel along Country Club Road to the Maryville Country Club. Council members have said golfers sometimes use golf carts on the road on the way to the club, but the road has a speed limit of 30 mph.

Heiland said that city police officers would instead be instructed to enforce the restriction on a case-by-case basis in the general area surrounding the Country Club.

“We’ve looked at this over and over again, and we really feel like this is the most efficient way to do this without just throwing a bunch of language into this code, is … to train them in their expectations of that area,” he said. “… Odds are, if they’re going to the country club, they’re gonna have a golf bag in the back and it’s gonna be fairly obvious what they’re doing on (Country Club Road) with that.”

Council member Dannen Merrill was the lone vote against the measure, though Bryan Williams, who has consistently said he is against legalizing UTVs on city streets, was absent from Monday’s meeting. Williams, a firefighter and paramedic, has said he opposes the measure because of safety concerns inherent with operating UTVs alongside other motor vehicles on city streets. Explaining his “no” vote, Merrill said he agreed.

“I’ve had a lot of conversations with my father, a retired state trooper, about this, and I just think — we’ve got them off the road now, why introduce something that could potentially cause more hazards?” he said.

Other City Council notes

• The council voted to extend a moratorium on large-scale commercial, industrial and mixed-use development projects exceeding 60 contiguous acres. Heiland said the moratorium is to allow the city more time to draft language concerning such developments, which the council could discuss early next year. The ordinance prohibits “the filing, acceptance, approval, permitting, or commencement” of the project types above. However, Heiland said the moratorium could be adjusted “on the fly” if a developer came to the city with a mixed-use project of interest, and said that the moratorium acts as an “extra step” if an industrial developer approached the city with a project the council would be interested in approving.
• Council members approved the $12,027.76 purchase of eight Zebra mobile thermal printers for the Maryville Police Department from MTE Office Center. Police Chief Mike Stolte said that a new records management system allows officers to electronically generate and print citations directly from their patrol vehicles instead of having to write them out. Printing them will make citations easier to fill out and easier to read, make them more standardized, and reduce clerical errors and time spent roadside.
• The council also approved the $100,384.40 purchase of two 2027 Ford Police Interceptors from Tri-State Ford Lincoln. The department received a Missouri Blue Shield Grant for $29,069 in July that will be put toward the purchase. The new vehicles will replace a 2013 Ford Explorer and a 2018 Ford Explorer that each has about 150,000 miles on it, Stolte said.
• Council members approved a $30,998.34 agreement with Fluid Equipment to replace a guard rail and install a new pump at the Country Club Lift Station.
• The council appointed Matt Blackney to the Maryville Housing Authority Board to fill the unexpired term of Joe Hayes, who resigned. Hayes’ term ends May 31, 2028. The council also reappointed Teckla Ehmke and James Jacoby to four-year terms expiring May 31, 2030.
• Council members voted to cancel the regular meeting scheduled for Dec. 28.