By Rupert Howell

Recent commercial site and building design standards recommended by the City of Batesville’s Planning Commission and adopted by the city board of mayor and aldermen went into effect March 19.

The ordinance establishes commercial site and building design standards and methods of administration and enforcement while joining the subdivision regulations, zoning regulations and building codes as the city’s means of fostering community design and safety.

Areas covered in the ordinance include: commercial development plan, architectural guidelines, lighting, utilities, screening, sidewalks, retaining walls, signs, materials and colors, landscaping, and off-site improvements.

Batesville’s Code Enforcement Office Administrator Pam Comer said current commercial structures would not be immediately affected until their was a change in occupant’s purpose or remodeling to the outside of the commercial building.

The new ordinance supersedes other regulations but only affects building signs in the signage portion.

Batesville Electrical Supply owner Terry Sparks questions the “lighting” portion of the standards stating, “I don’t like them.”

 Sparks explained that all replacement lights in his inventory would be obsolete under the new ordinance and noted lighting at local grocery stores and shopping centers would be illegal under the new standards including the decorative new lights recently placed by the City of Batesville at the cloverleaf intersection of Highways 6 and I-55.

Comer noted that regulations governing those lights on Highway 6 don’t fall under the city, are not commercial and fall under the jurisdiction of the Mississippi Department of Transportation.

Sparks also explained that chain stores such as Kroger have national standards for lighting parking lots and said the local store had to use 1000 watt light bulbs on top of 35-40’ poles to meet standards where Batesville’s new standard “shall not exceed 25’ in height.”

Sparks also said that the lighting on the building that houses his store, like many other existing buildings, would not pass new standards that recently went into effect.

Comer said Monday that rules in the ordinance are all subject to review.

“It’s going to be reasonable. The Planning Commission will have some wiggle room.

“This is minimum compared to what a lot of cities have,” Comer said adding that some complain that Batesville is trying to be like municipalities who are known for very strict regulations such as Germantown, Tennessee or Madison, Mississippi.

“We may not want to be like them, but we don’t be like a nobody, either,” she added.