The room was packed with residents of the Linton community, who had complaints about gates blocking public access roads in their area, when Trigg County’s Fiscal Court met on the evening of Monday. The meeting was the first without Magistrate Doug Taylor, who resigned last week to take a state job.

Shawn Underwood and other Linton residents said they had 250 signatures on a petition to have the county take over roads in their area. According to them, gates were put up that block access to their properties. Several of the residents also said the River Oak hasn’t given them keys to the locks on the gates.

“Right now, these people are locked out,” Underwood said. “We really need these roads open.”

The residents said that their issue was with roughly five – eight gates on roads such as Fire Tower Road, McCoy Hollow Road and Donnie Lane. They also said that it is illegal to block county roads.

The locked gates are a public safety concern as well, as fire department vehicles could not access the properties if there was a fire, residents told the fiscal court on Monday.

“If there’s a fire up there, we all pay taxes,” one resident said. “You can’t get up there for a fire.”

Humphries said West Vaco originally put up the gates, and that the gates that went up were, at the time, going to be temporary, and were also going to build and maintain roads in the area to better transport logs. Humphries added it was his understanding that the gates were put up to keep out trespassers and to stop illegal dumping and littering.

(For the rest of the story, check out this week's edition of the Cadiz Record.)