Drivers cruising down Rebecca Street in Covington may want to reduce their speeds when driving through the area after Covington council members approved a speed decrease on the street at their meeting Monday night.
The council voted unanimously to approve reducing the speed limit to 25 mph on Rebecca Street, after citizens complained about excessive speeding in the area. Covington Police Chief Stacy Cotton told council that the police department placed a speed monitoring machine in the area to see how fast cars were actually traveling down the street.
The original speed limit on Rebecca Street was 30 mph. Cotton said the average speed recorded by the machine was 29 mph. He said they found that only 11 percent of vehicles went over speeds of 35 mph.
Also at the meeting, the council agreed that they would donate one of their used vehicles to the Newton College and Career Academy for educational purposes. NCCA CEO/principal James Woodward said they asked a few county agencies if they would donate vehicles to their automotive program. He said the vehicles would be used by students to practice brake and electrical skills. Woodward said the academy hopes to have at least four vehicles donated.
In other business, a local tattoo artist appeared before council to address his concerns with the day-to-day operations of tattoo shops in Covington. Ricky Smith said he has had to comply with environmental health regulations and he felt as though other tattoo businesses in the city did not only meeting the bare minimum of inspections and regulations. Smith said he has made complaints with environmental health about the practices of unsafe tattoo shops being run in Covington, but they have ignored his complaints. Smith said he wanted to make the council aware of what was going on.
The council also approved two alcoholic beverage licenses at their meeting. A license to sell alcoholic beverages for on-premises consumption only was approved for Five O'clock Somewhere located at Turner Lake Road and a license to sell alcoholic beverages for off-premises consumption only was approved for the Chevron on Alcovy Road.
