T-L Photos/GAGE VOTA St. Clairsville Planning and Zoning Administrator Tom Murphy informs St. Clairsville City Council that he believes council and the St. Clairsville Architecture Review Board are all on the same page with wanting to update the city’s signage guidelines. Sitting to the left of Murphy is St. Clairsville Finance Director Annette Nichols.

ST. CLAIRSVILLE — Businesses in St. Clairsville’s historic downtown may soon be able to showcase their businesses in a way they previously weren’t allowed.

The St. Clairsville City Council on Tuesday night discussed the possibility of passing an ordinance to allow businesses in historic downtown to display hanging signs. Such signs have been banned in that neighborhood.

This past December, Councilman J.C. Thrash informed council that several businesses in the downtown district approached him about wanting to install overhead signs.

When Thrash presented that information to the council, St. Clairsville Planning and Zoning Administrator Tom Murphy told him that he would bring it to the attention of the St. Clairsville Architecture Review Board.

According to the St. Clairsville Architecture Review Board’s website, “The Historic Downtown District Architectural Review Ordinance was established to provide a design review mechanism for the purpose of protecting and preserving the character of the downtown district as an historic and economic resource for the community.”

Murphy informed council Tuesday that he believes he, the council and the Architecture Review Board are on the same page in wanting council to make an ordinance to allow businesses to display hanging signs.

The new ordinance would reverse an ordinance passed in 1991 that banned hanging signs for businesses in downtown. In 1994, St. Clairsville’s downtown was recognized by the National Register of Historic Places to ensure that the city preserved its historic architecture.

“This all took place in the 1990s, I think it’s about time to update our signage guidelines,” Murphy said. “I think we should take a big picture approach to those design guidelines, rather than just look at the projecting sign guidelines, let’s look at the entire sign section of those design guidelines.”

He added that he believes when making the new guidelines not only should the council be involved but the Architecture Review Board, businesses that will be affected, and any resident who may want their voice heard on the matter should be involved.

“I think that really the most important thing is ensuring that the business owners, the property owners, and the public, are involved in the process. We don’t want it to have it look like the city or city council are coming up with guidelines changes and then not involving them. That wouldn’t look good for anybody,” he said. “We want to have transparency, we can set up the public hearings and have meetings and if nobody comes at least we did as much as we could.”

He then suggested potentially setting up a meeting with the St. Clairsville Area Chamber of Commerce and the St. Clairsville Main Street Small Business group and several different local business owners.

Council member Kristi Lipscomb told Murphy she has been in talks with the St. Clairsville Main Street Small Business Group about her and whichever council members would be able to attend one of its meetings.

“I know from talking to people in the past, even before I got on council, I think a lot of people have been met with a lot of resistance from the Architectural Review Committee on choices and improvements that they wanted to make to their property,” Lipscomb said. “So I thought the best way to start the dialogue would be for the council to invite the public to contact us and meet with the business owners and property owners in a place where they feel comfortable.”

Lipscomb added that she believes this would provide the business and property owners to vent their frustration or express their past experiences without fear of retaliation. She said that she doesn’t believe that anyone would retaliate but wants to take the extra step to ensure nobody would.

Council President Jim Velas asked Lipscomb if she thought that the business and property owners would feel intimidated if they met at the city building.

“Yes I do, I don’t think that it’s fair and I think that there’s a lot of bad blood between a lot of property owners and the city,” she replied.

Council member Terra Butler asked if Lipscomb meant between the property owners and the Architecture Review Board, to which she replied yes.

“I’ve heard of nasty emails, I haven’t seen them but I’ve just heard a lot of negative things,” Lipscomb said. “I don’t know how they feel they have been restricted but I know there is a general feeling that they have been restricted.”

Butler, who is also the owner of Newellstown Diner, agreed with Lipscomb that the meeting should be held outside of a city building.

“As far as the committee when we have talked before, everything was based on what they perceived to be aesthetically pleasing to the city and if they didn’t like it then it wasn’t going,” Butler said. “I feel like we’ve just gotten to the point that the council wants to move with this and work with businesses.”

She added that she believes things have been extremely restricted for a long time and thinks that the council working directly with the business owners will be the most effective way to go about making the update.

The council all agreed that the next step should be to reach out to the local businesses and property owners to set up a meeting.