Seeking Information and Advice re: Planning and Zoning Issues (Vanity)

The council of our small town has determined that our zoning ordinances are a mess, lacking any hint of coherence or logic. The code has been applied in a haphazard and probably illegal manner by past administrations. Council has formed a planning commission and I am one of those named to serve. We are charged with rewriting the zoning code.

We have only about 1,100 residents, nearly two-thirds of whom are transient college students. We cannot afford to hire a consultant to devise a town plan. We want to make the town business-friendly without negatively affecting the quality of life or property values of homeowners. We also have to consider whether to annex property that may be the site of a major development.

Existing businesses, all on Main Street, include a bar, a general store, a hair salon and a convenience store/pizzaria/coffeeshop enterprise. Other Main Street buildings are owned, for the most part, by the college or non-resident landlords.

You're not going to like this answer, but after 6 years on my local planning commission, and in private practice as an architect and urban designer, the situation that you describe is simply the way that zoning ordinances work. Wait, really, I'm not trying to be cynical, only factual. And no, I'm not a Libertarian. As a rational matter, it's my experience that virturally none of the good things promised by zoning ever materialize, but the "collateral damage" (ie, added costs for development, erosion of property rights, corruption, special preferences etc etc etc.) do.

If it's a legal option in your state and county, the best option is to not have a zoning ordinance. If that's not possible legally, then the next most important things (in order) are:

1. Keep it simple. Have as few different zones as possible (say one residental, one commercial, one industrial) with simple, logical requirements. If possible, have the zones "tiered" (ie, allow the less "impactful" uses in the more intensive zones, to minimize the restrictions placed on private property. For example, you can allow residential uses in commercial zones, commercial uses in industrial zones etc.)

2. Have as few (or no) discretionary reviews. These take the form of conditional use permits that are issued by staff or the planning commission on a 'case by case' basis. The problem here is that discretion often turns into favoritism or downright irrational extortion relative to the proposed development. It's tempting, but you'll be sorry if you give in to this. The same goes for design review boards -- don't do it. Best case is that you'll get a group of under-employed gadflies demanding hansel-and-gretel gingerbread on everything. Worst case is that you'll get a group making development so expensive that it'll never happen (even the good stuff that you do want and need).

3. Start with a survey of existing conditions. This can be as simple as the commission and staff taking a couple of weekends to drive around town and note setbacks, lot coverage etc., or the product of an expensive consultant. In either event, what you want to do is avoid creating a bunch of "non-conforming" uses with your new ordinance by accident. You don't want to do it on purpose, either, IMHO.

4. Don't let the college kids or their professors anywhere near this effort. They don't have the same committment to your town as you do, and most likely have all sorts of goofy notions about private property that you won't share. Plus, they're called 'students' for a reason -- they still have their heads at least half full of mush, and the professors, well..., I'll leave that thought here.

5. DO involve the rest of the town. Set a schedule for the enterprise (say 12 months), and schedule a series of publicly-noticed workshops at 1-2 month intervals. I'd start with an introductory meeting, and then one meeting per major zone designation to discuss goals (not procedures) for each planning area. The other way you could structure the public workshops is by neighborhood if this makes more sense for your area, but you then run a greater risk of a complex ordinance that divides the residents even more than is necessary.

Good luck, and, seriously, you ought to give consideration to the "no zoning" option. Oh, and the note in a post above about the "general plan" (which is what it's called in California law) is probably correct. You most likely will have to start with the plan and then move to the implementing zoning, but my sad advice above still applies. Just substitute "general plan designation" (or whatever your state law calls it) for "zone". FRegards

As one who sat on a Zoning Board for 12 years, here is my two cents.

First, look at what your state statutes enable you to do. Do not let your transient population (college students)decide what the permanent residents will have to live with(I have had some expierience in that area), but holding public meetings is a must to develop a Master(Comprehensive)Plan.

Once the Master Plan is developed then the Zoning Ordinance can be written. For a town of 1100 folks I think it would take a little common sense and a little research into other municipalities around the country.

The biggest problem is going to be the makeup of the individuals who eventually wind up on the Planning and Zoning Boards.There will be endless appeals for "variances" from the Zoning plan. If these variances are arbitarily approved, then save yourself a lot of aggrivation and don't have a Zoning Ordinance. Success will depend upon the Character of the members of the boards and those who appoint them. Good Luck.

I am a small time self storage developer/owner(as compared to the REITS). Zoning aparatchiks, planning commission commissars, and codes department sadists are the bane of my livelyhood. As a previous poster said, Houston has no zoning and appears to function rather well but if you want the pristine Norman Rockwell environs then you will have to institute some restrictions. My issue with all the powers that be in this field are not that they are unneeded but rather that they are inept, lazy, and create problems where problems do not exist in order to justify their employment. Many of them are frustrated folks who couldn't cut it in the private sector as well. On a whim they can increase the costs of my investments by 50% or better and in some cases kill it outright. With a new liberal mayor here in my fair city, we now have these departments headed by Sierra Club types who have made it plainly known how they feel about developing anything besides parks and greenways. It's a real mess.

On the other hand ...there are local government folks who absolutely love me.....the property tax gang....I wish my real estate was worth what they are always proclaiming. I bought some acreage last year for 320K and viola!!!....less than 3 months later they informed me that they thought it was worth 485K. I called the County Tax Trustee and told him I would be glad to sell it to him right away for that price. Needless to say I'm appealing. Come to think of it, I'm always appealing tax appraisals and F&E assessments.

Good Luck...you have no inkling of what sort of hell you will have unleashed. Trust me...if it ain't broke...don't fix it.

Follow thru with these regs and see what happens next time you want to build a garage or gazebo on your property.....or even if you want to park your bass boat or RV on your lot...once you open Pandora's box on this stuff...it'll chip away at stuff you now take for granted.

Regards.

Well, Mountaineer, these replies are a fair representation of some of the issues you and your compatriots will be seeing over the next couple of months. It sounds like you have a zoning code or ordinance, so one may ask "what is wrong with the one you have?". Having worked with small towns for a number of years, generally a zoning code is amended or rewritten as the result of some action viewed by the city fathers et al as not what the builder/developer/good old boy promised he would do. This is followed by a "won't let that happen again" so an ordinance or amendment gets passed to assuage the town fathers. Or it could be the "premptive strike" after seeing what happened in the next town down the road.

Above all, involve the community, workshops where the views of all can shared are important to build the consensus needed to provide the support the planning commission and city council will need to have a effective zoning ordinance and when they attempt to change the status quo.

Consider carefully the use of pyramid zoning, where less intensive uses say residential, are allowed in commercial, as mentioned above. As the town matures, this type of zoning structure provides unwelcome surprises for new owners years in the future. A commercially zone tract of ground that is developed as apartments (which generally would be legal under pyramid zoning) may or may not be what is in the town's best interest. Beware of overzoning, overlaying commercial districts on existing residential areas because "they may become commercial". Let the market place determine when a home has more value as business site and have the developer get the change in zoning at that time.

Please keep us posted as you navigate the mine field that lays before you.

No, we don't believe more government is the answer, and yes, I also have philosophical problems with any governmental entity telling people what to do with their property. However, the townsfolk - the ones who live in the houses they own, not the landlords or college students - have reasonable concerns that an undesirable business, e.g., another bar, might open next door to the homes they've worked so hard to purchase and improve. We already have a bar and several frat houses in or near residential streets, and they are nuisances.

This all came to a head when a fellow wanted to open a bed and breakfast on a residential street. There was no place for parking, and neighbors were afraid that a business in the middle of a residential area would create traffic and noise problems. However, they appreciate that having businesses is a good thing. There's a balance to be worked, and I'm hoping we can do it with the least possible regulation.

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