ROGERS — Sign dancers. We’ve got them in Rogers, but maybe not for long.
Sign dancers are the folks who stand at intersections and near businesses advertising a product or service. Frankly, I think the businesses ought to buy newspaper ads. That said, I am not willing to say sign dancers should be eliminated, so to speak.
That’s not actually what a proposal from a committee studying the city’s sign ordinance said. The proposal — which has been to one public hearing and is slated for a second in November — would force sign dancers off the right of way and on privately property.
That makes about as much sense as baseball’s infield fly rule.
For one thing, that right of way? Taxpayers paid for it or are paying for it.
For another, this would require business owners to try to get property owners to agree to allow a dancer from another business to dance on their property. Does anyone else see a potential issue with this?
Say the sign dancer’s boss says go dance. He or she does, not knowing whether permission has been granted. The property owner gets angry and calls the cops. What’s an officer to do?
And honestly, don’t the boys and girls in blue have better things to do than mediate a sign dancer fight?
The official reason for this silly piece of proposed legislation is the idea sign dancers might distract drivers. Hello? Everything distracts drivers.
My colleague John Gore asked Rogers police if there had been reports of accidents caused by drivers distracted by dancers. Oddly, they don’t track accidents caused by sign dancer distraction. However, knowing cops as I do, had they worked a wreck caused by a sign dancer, the story would likely live in infamy.
Let’s face it, public right of way or private property, no matter where a dancer dances, if it is going to distract a driver, it is going to distract a driver.
I think someone thinks street dancers look tacky and don’t want them on city streets. I think I’ve seen costumed advertising specialists pretty much everywhere I’ve been, but I suppose tacky is in the eye of the beholder.
And the very likely upshot of this proposal is that business owners are going to give up sign dancers and some people won’t work as a result. Now that makes a lot of sense.
Why not make them get a permit — everything else under the sun is permitted — and place limits on the hours they can dance, how many can dance and the size of signs?
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Compressed natural gas, or CNG — Benton County Judge Bob Clinard is obsessed with it.
And I salute Clinard for his desire to cut fuel costs and be more environmentally responsible. Unfortunately, when I think compressed natural gas, I think of diesel.
Remember diesel? Sure, it is still the fuel of choice for big rigs, but some time in the past, when gas prices were soaring, diesel was seen as our savior from dependence on imported oil. Convert those cars to diesel! It’s cheaper!
Or it was. That didn’t last long, and people didn’t want their cars making that clattering noise pickups make. There was also that low temperature thing. If the temperature dropped below a certain level, the diesel froze so you had to plug in your car to keep it warm if you were going to make it to work the next morning.
I don’t know much about CNG, but as far as I know clattering and freezing aren’t issues. I can’t predict the cost issue with any certainty, but I would bet if we start using a lot of it, the cost would go up. That’s what happens with gasoline. Big holiday coming up? Watch the prices soar.
The problems with CNG are availability and the cost to convert vehicles so they will run on CNG. According to greencar.com, conversion costs can run $12,500 to $22,500 per vehicle. Ouch! The only light-duty vehicle you can buy ready to burn the fuel is the Honda GX, according to greencar.com. The cost of the 2012 version of the Honda starts at $26,305, according to automobiles.honda.com.
As for availability, cngprices.com show the nearest stations in Stilwell and Miami, Okla., and Springfield, Mo. Long way to go for a fill up.
I hope we do find a way to limit our dependence on foreign oil and be kinder to the environment. Compressed natural gas may, unfortunately, not be the answer.
Leeanna Walker is local editor of the Rogers Morning News and the Springdale Morning News. Follow her on Twitter at www.twitter.com/NWALeeanna.