Not
in my back yard!
(wanna bet?)
 |
|
Planning comes first. Zoning is the tool
to help implement the plan.
|
Land
Use Planning,
Zoning
local leaders believe the
time has long since come ...
are we ready yet?
By Karen Clem Fritz
Pulaski County is a rural paradise, and most who live here hope to
preserve its small town wholesomeness for a long time to come.
But that will never happen, according to community and economic development
experts, unless county leaders move quickly to initiate planning and
zoning measures to protect the county from the ever increasing dangers
of haphazard development which can result in a negative impact on local
economy and quality of life issues.
Demographics show that each year, the number of families relocating
to rural areas from the larger cities is growing. Modern communications
technology, transportation and the desire to raise families in a small
town setting all contribute to the move. Pulaski County is experiencing
growing pressure from the continual expansion of northwest Indiana,
and U.S. 421 is a funnel into the county - for better and worse.
Over the past 40 years, Pulaski County has had a long and agonized history
involving the various attempts to draw up a comprehensive land use plan
to guide its future development. A referendum on a zoning plan was turned
down by voters in the late 1960s. In the years since, meetings to discuss
the issue have been disrupted by outspoken opponents of zoning, and
county officials have even been threatened if they pursued the matter.
“Planning scares some people,” acknowledges Val Slack of Purdue
University’s Cooperative Extension Service in West Lafayette. “No
one wants to be told what to do, and some feel planning threatens individual
rights.”
But more and more, local residents appear to be reaching the understanding
that land use planning is a vital means of protecting their own property
values, and more importantly, enhancing the local economy and preserving
the rural nature of the communities.
Pulaski County is the only remaining county in northern Indiana without
county-wide planning and zoning. Residents, business owners, farmers
and county economic developers have come to realize this leaves the
county very vulnerable.
When the county council created the Pulaski County Community Development
Commission (CDC) over 10 years ago, the new commission members soon
concluded that the county’s economic development was hampered by
the lack of county planning.
Whether it’s outside residential housing developers or prospective
business and industry owners looking to locate in Pulaski County, they
are all accustomed to zoning and feel unprotected and uneasy about proceeding
without it.
After several years of attempting to work without a zoning plan, the
CDC undertook a study of the county’s needs and potential and developed
its own strategic plan to assist the commission in its community development
efforts. A centerpiece of the plan, adopted in early 2004, was to develop
a land use master plan and zoning ordinances by 2005.
“I guarantee you that the lack of planning and zoning is hampering
your economic development,” Jim Mooney, a Valparaiso consultant
on the strategic plan, told the CDC at the time.
But any effort to proceed with planning and zoning for the county must
be approved by the county commissioners.
Three years after adopting its strategic plan, the CDC has yet to win
the support of the commissioners.
A new effort begins
But recent events in the county have led the CDC to initiate a new
effort to educate county residents and prepare a guide and timeline
to present to the commissioners to enable them to begin the process
for land use planning for Pulaski County.
The CDC is not alone in promoting this issue. Many other elected officials,
including county council members and town board members, plus business,
industrial and agricultural leaders, developers, and health department
and school officials are in favor of county planning and zoning.
|
What
zoning can and cannot do
Zoning
Can:
•assist economic growth by helping reserve adequate and desirable
sites for industrial and commercial users.
•protect property from inconsistent or harmful use.
•protect individual property owners from harmful or undesirable
uses of adjacent property.
•provide orderly and systematic transition in land use that
benefit all land uses through public hearings and local decisions.
•help prevent objections to normal and necessary farming
operations.
•make the community more attractive by assisting the preservation
of open space, unique natural resources, and natural terrain features.
•inform residents where industry will be allowed to develop
in an orderly fashion.
•protect a community's historic and architectural heritage.
•provide standards for population density and traffic circulation.
Zoning
Cannot:
•change or correct land uses already in existence.
•prohibit farm buildings or interfere in farming decisions,
such as crop or livestock selection.
•establish higher development standards than the community
desires.
•guarantee that industrial, commercial, or tourism development
will take place.
•assure that land uses will be permanently retained as assigned
under the zoning resolution. (Rezoning is possible in response
to changing conditions and unanticipated opportunities.)
•replace a building code.
•assure the proper administration of the zoning ordinance.
From “Communities on Course:
Land Use”
Purdue University Cooperative Extension
|
Pulaski County’s new commissioner, Paul Grandstaff, admits he
has much to learn on the issue.
“I can see that there are points on both sides,” he says.
“But my general impression is that not having it (zoning) is going
to hurt us more than help us. I think ultimate approval will depend
on how a proposed plan is worded.”
Commissioner Terry Young has expressed an interest in developing ordinances
that would address residential subdivision development, junk yards,
mobile homes and right-to-farm issues.
Fred Jeffers, Pulaski County’s new building commissioner, is eager
for the county to adopt a land use plan. In fact, he stresses the county
“needs it yesterday.
“Businesses are not going to come here unless we have the rules
and regulations that protect them,” he explains. “Starke,
Marshall and Jasper counties are booming, and we’re missing out.”
Jeffers is also troubled by some of the requests coming into his office.
If scare tactics are what’s needed to move people on this issue,
he can provide them.
“In the last four weeks, I’ve had four separate inquiries
about locating junk yards in the county,” he reports. “They
already have the land, and there’s nothing to be done to prevent
them.”
Jeffers shares another new inquiry that gives him pause, a proposal
to build a primate “nursing home,” reportedly a facility for
the baboons used in pharmaceutical testing to live out the remainder
of their lives.
Such a business may prove in the end to be a sound enterprise. But the
lack of zoning here leads to suspicion about such inquiries and places
the county in danger of being a laughing stock or worse.
Apparently even the Amish - the standard bearers of separation from
the modern world - won’t locate a business in Pulaski County without
zoning.
Extension educator Michael Reetz relates a recent experience of meeting
with two Amish men, driven to his office from Ohio, who were seeking
to purchase land in Pulaski County to expand their business. After asking
a series of questions, they inquired about the county’s zoning
regulations. When Reetz told him there weren’t any, they responded
that they felt uncomfortable locating in an area without zoning and
left.
How to begin?
Val Slack of Purdue’s community land use department says communities
need “maps,” or comprehensive plans, to lead them successfully
into the future.
The first step the commissioners must take to begin the land use planning
process is to appoint a county plan commission. A plan commission is
a legally mandated group of people who draft a comprehensive plan and
a zoning ordinance. They also make recommendations to elected officials
on proposed changes.
Planning comes first. Zoning is the tool to help implement the plan.
Plan commissions prepare communities for growth and change. They serve
a unique position in local government. It is an independent commission
made up of private citizens with neither legislative nor administrative
authority. It is an advisor to a governing body. It also advises local
governmental departments and officials, public agencies, private developers
and other individuals on matters related to the community’s development.
The planning legislation found in the Indiana Code encourages each city,
town and county of the state to create a plan commission. Planning and
zoning assist local governments in the protection of the health, safety
and welfare of citizens.
Once the plan commission prepares a draft for a comprehensive land use
plan and zoning ordinances, a public hearing is held. Finally, the commission
recommends it to the commissioners who may reject, amend or approve
the ordinance.
It usually takes as long as two years to complete the process, but the
CDC hopes it can be done sooner.
A county-wide discussion on land use planning and zoning needs to take
place - similar to the debate this past year on the time zone issue.
Feedback on this issue may be directed to the CDC
office at (phone) 574-946-3869,
(fax) 574-946-3852 or (email) ddolezal@pulaskionline.org
Comments may also be directed to ExPRESS by email at express@pulaskicountyexpress.com
|
