PORT HADLOCK – A Jefferson County businessman’s biggest customer has told him to quit working.
For the past four years, Rich Holtman of Port Ludlow has owned a Port Hadlock business at 10473 Rhody Drive with his wife, Cathy.
The business, Highway Specialties, rents traffic signs for road work projects, and its biggest customer, said Holtman, has been the Jefferson County Public Works Department.
The city of Port Townsend also makes use of Holtman’s signs, as do various fire departments within the county.
“We are the only traffic control supplier this side of the Tacoma Narrows,” Holtman said.
On March 20, the county Department of Community Development posted a stop-work order in front of Holtman’s business.
The commercial business is operating on land that is zoned rural residential, said Al Scalf, director of the Department of Community Development.
That zoning is incompatible with Holtman’s business, said Scalf.
“Part of our responsibility as a department is enforcement,” he said.
The Department of Community Development enforces zoning violations based on complaints.
