BY DALE ELLIS

Managing Editor  10/17/2001

Last winter, residents along Dick Finch Road near the White County community of Joy, discovered one additional headache to go along with the normal winter woes associated with life in Northcentral Arkansas. The road that is their link to the outside world became impassable for all but the most rugged four-wheel-drive vehicles.

In February, residents of Dick Finch Road, with Sharri Stewart as their spokesperson, petitioned the White County Quorum Court to have their road taken into the county system.

Stewart said that in February, Cabot attorney James Hensley, Jr. prepared a petition for the residents to file with the court to have that done.

"It sounded so simple," Stewart said. "We got together and got signatures of 98 percent of the landowners, not the 51 percent we were required to get."

Stewart said matters got more and more complicated, however, the further she got into the process, and she said the matter has been complicated by what she views as reluctance on the part of White County Judge Bob Parish to allow the road into the system.

"Every month we have gone to the quorum court, and every month we've been told we have to fulfill more requirements to have our road accepted," Stewart said. "It's reached the point where we are all just really frustrated with the county."

Stewart and John Bush, a resident of Dick Finch Road, said residents have worked to maintain the road themselves to keep it passable, but it is a losing battle and they now need help from the county.

"Last winter the road went down and we couldn't get out with anything less than a four-wheel-drive," Bush told The Daily Citizen. "We have people with medical problems who need to be able to get out of here in an emergency, and when this road gets really bad, they can't do it."

Parish said that he is not blocking the effort to get the road accepted, but there are some requirements that must be met, and so far have not been. One of those requirements is that residents must pay to have gravel placed on the road.

The cost of the gravel is a major factor, amounting to approximately $300 per resident according to Parish. However, the cost could be more than many residents can pay, Stewart said, and she also said at this point, she no longer trusts Parish.

"What if we put more money into the road and he tells us we have to do something else?" Stewart said. "We've done everything we've been told but every time we go back to the quorum court, something else comes up."

The county has been performing "courtesy grades" of the road, where it sends out a road grader to smooth the road out, but Stewart said those were stopped after Parish said the grader operator was told to stop grading by a resident of the road.

Parish said the county grader operator was told to get off the road and had no choice but to comply.

"One individual criticized our grader operator and told him to get off of there, and he had to because we had nothing saying it was a public road," the county judge said.

John Bush said he was behind the grader operator, however, on the day that was supposed to have happened, and that he never observed anyone approach the operator.

"I was behind the grader and he stopped and flagged me," Bush said. "He said, "I just got a call from Judge Parish and he said for you to get all the names for the grade before I can come back out here.' I said what for and he said he didn't know, that somebody had complained or something like that and until we got everybody's names, he couldn't grade anymore.

"I asked Parish who that person was, and the person he told me was with me that day," Bush said. "I know that wasn't him."

A petition for a courtesy grade has since been filed with the county.

Bush and Stewart have both said that Dick Finch, the developer of the area, had initially agreed to maintain the road, but has not done so for some time, and the road has gotten worse and worse.

Two documents dated July 16, 2001, turned over the roadway to the county for a public road. One of those is signed by 28 property owners along Dick Finch Road and the other is signed by Dick and Sylvia Finch.

However, making the road a public road still does not make it a road maintained by the county, and there is some confusion over just what ordinance the road should be brought in under, if at all.

County ordinance 91-15 requires that roads brought into the county system must meet standards set by the state highway department. County ordinance 99-9 requires that subdivisions meet more stringent standards.

Two quorum court members who were reached for comment said they agree something needs to be done, but what the county can legally do is not clear.

However, both Bob Barnum and Mike Cleveland said Dick Finch road does not, in their opinion, qualify as subdivision, and should be dealt with under the older ordinance.

"I'd like to see the road brought in," Barnum said. "I've driven it several times and when you can't get into your place in the wintertime, that's a bad deal. But people don't have $9,000 to put gravel on their road."

Barnum said he does not know what can be done to bring the residents relief, but he would like to see something happen.

Cleveland also said he does not believe the area is a subdivision, since the smallest plot of land it contains is five acres, and the rest range in size up to 50 acres, and that he would like to see it brought in as well.

"That road is in better shape than a lot of county roads and those people have been pulled all over the place on this," Cleveland said. "We need to get this behind us."

The matter comes before the quorum court tonight for a vote on a second reading of the ordinance. The first reading passed last month by a vote of 9-4.

Hershel Barnett, the Justice of the Peace who represents the Dick Finch Road area, was unavailable for comment Monday night.

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