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"For What It's Worth....."

COMMISSIONERS LISTENED TO THE PEOPLE

Publisher's Note: As of the writing of this "For What It's Worth," county commissioners have scrapped the proposed thoroughfare overlay districts per commissioner Carrol Mitchem.

I’ve received a couple of letters from readers to my recent “For
What It’s Worth” on City and County Government.

Both responses are from members of Lincoln County
government. First up is Randy Hawkins, Building and Land
Development (BALD) zoning administrator. He writes:

“The proposal (overlay thoroughfare districts) in no way calls for the county to use the power of eminent domain. It would only impose an additional layer of development regulations, not take anybody’s property.”

Also, Randy writes:

“U.S. 321 Is included in the proposal. The public hearing notice lists it as one of the highways. The map that’s part of the proposal shows it as proposed as a Rural Thoroughfare Overlay. I particularly take offense at this misconception being spread, because one speaker left the impression that I had something to do with this.”

Thanks for the clarification, Randy. A former journalist with over
20 years experience in covering Lincoln County, Randy’s certain
about his facts before making any kind of presentation. I
appreciate his counsel and support. Moreover, I appreciate the
time he’s taken to clarify these points.

County commissioner George Arena also sent the following:

“As a recently elected Commissioner, I would like to take the
time to address the concerns of the citizens that were at the
recent public hearing for the Thoroughfare Overlay Districts on
Monday night, as well as our citizens who were not at the
meeting.

I would also like to clear up some of the confusion that resulted from the post card mailed by the county to citizens who live along our key roads and highways. That post card was poorly written and resulted in some significant misunderstandings regarding Overlay Districts.

Because of the size of the crowd and the emotion and confusion associated with the Unified Development Ordinance and the Overlay Districts, it was difficult to present my perspective and have a meaningful, in-depth discussion after the public comments were finished.

I would like the chance to work to bridge the gap that exists
between our citizens from the different areas of the county and
to develop the tools that work for the different needs of the
different townships.

Otherwise we will continue to have this divide, which does none of us any good. As a county, we need to work together to resolve these issues and then we must improve our focus on the bigger picture of strengthening our economy and diversifying our tax base.

First, the Unified Development Ordinance (UDO) is exactly what it says it is. It is a single ordinance document focused on
providing developers and county staff, one source that they can utilize, for development and zoning.

Over the years, several separate ordinances and policies were
enacted in Lincoln County, including a zoning ordinance, a
subdivision ordinance, an Adequate Public Facilities Policy, a
Transportation Policy, etc. The Unified Development Ordinance is an effort that was started almost TWO years ago, to combine hundreds of pages of documentation in separate, applicable documents into one, comprehensive document.

Because of the magnitude of this effort, it requires us to move
forward carefully and use common sense, reasonableness,
patience and good communications as it is brought into effect.

Second, the vast majority of content in this new UDO is a
combining of previous ordinances as they were written into a
more appropriate indexed, formatted and referenced document.

It is not 388 pages of “new rules, regulations and ordinances” as some have commented. It is predominately an effort to bring all of the previous documents together as they were written.

Several counties have their ordinances in UDO form and in order to be successful and competitive going forward, we need one comprehensive document that is easy to reference and use. BUT IT HAS TO BE A DOCUMENT THAT TAKES INTO ACOUNT THE DIVERSITY AND DIFFERENT NEEDS ACROSS THE COUNTY.

Third, yes, there are, in fact, some new elements in this
document and they need to be carefully understood and
decided upon, either for the county as a whole or for pertinent
sections of the county.

As this document was being developed, the county put into
effect a new Land Use Plan that, itself, took multiple years in
development. Citizens and organizational representatives from
all parts of the county were on the Land Use Plan Committee
and multiple public hearings were held before that Plan was
adopted.

It is a legal requirement for the County to have a thorough and
up to date Land Use Plan, as it is for the County to have
thorough and updated ordinances. That Land Use Plan is the
overall blueprint to guide how the county should be developed at a top level.

It DID NOT change any zoning of any parcel. It is a guiding
document with some legal implications. The Land Use Plan is
required to be considered in a request for a zoning change on a parcel. Without it, there would be no overall Plan to suggest
where commercial developments are best suited, where
industrial developments are best located, where rural areas
should maintain rural characteristics, etc.

Some new or more detailed elements that are in the UDO are
consistent with and result from elements of the Land Use Plan.
These are items such as: more detailed access and driveway
standards along highways for safety and compliance with
NCDOT requirements, more detailed sidewalk and parking
standards for pedestrian safety in commercial developments,
desired preservation of open space and the county’s tree canopy and providing additional development options for subdivisions such as cluster conservation subdivisions.

Specifically in regards to the Overlay Districts, valid concerns
were expressed at the recent Public Hearing. Also, the mailing
contributed to some significant misunderstandings.

In our current Zoning Ordinance, there is a Highway Overlay
definition. To my knowledge, it has not been used recently.
Because of the diversity throughout Lincoln County, it was felt
that in the UDO, better definitions could be developed for Urban (there are none yet in Lincoln County), Suburban and Rural Highways, instead of a single Highway Overlay Definition.

The first part of the Zoning Text Amendment that was presented at the Public Hearing, involved changes to the definitions and rules to be applied in these more specific Overlay Districts. The second part of the Zoning Text Amendment presented was a map of the key highways in the county and a recommendation as to which Overlay definitions were recommended being applied to which highways.

To remove some confusion, Overlay Districts and their
associated definitions and rules would “overlay” on parcels that are within 500 feet of the designated highway section.

They are intended ONLY for larger Planned Residential
Developments and Commercial and Industrial developments and only in parcels already zoned for those respective uses. These Overlays DO NOT change zoning or restrict an owner’s type of use of their property.

They DO NOT take any land from property owners for any
reason including right of way. The state controls and deals with right-of-way on these roads, not the County. They DO NOT change tax status or values.

A residentially zoned property owner with a residence or with
some vacant land on which to build a few houses would NOT be impacted. Even a land owner of a significantly sized
undeveloped parcel with residential zoning would only be
impacted if they decided to do a planned residential
development or sell their land to a developer for a planned
residential development.

Even in that case, the only impacts would be rules covering road access limitations (similar to what NCDOT already determines) and some viewshed requirements along the highway involving some level of landscaping or berming.

The remaining rules would apply to other aspects of commercial or industrial development only and these would include parking lot and sidewalk rules for pedestrian access and safety and some building design requirements. Again, those rules would apply only to those areas along these highways zoned for that type of business or industrial development.

Overlays can be an excellent tool if used correctly. I believe that the county errored in the attempted implementation of the
Overlay tool. Commissioners saw the map of suggested overlays shortly before the scheduled March 2nd meeting. The Overlay definitions had some key elements that needed to be corrected and the map was proposed to assign overlays to all key highways in the county.

The mailing also led people to be concerned about right-of-way issues, land grabbing and restrictions on use. The fact is we only currently need overlays in a few key areas to manage commercial and large scale development at this time. Old Hwy 16 is unsafe and results in a poor shopping experience, impacting businesses on it. A Highway 16 Overlay committee has been working for a number of months to develop an overlay for Old 16.

Our UDO needs to allow us the ability to have Overlays. But they should be implemented carefully, like it is being done on
Highway 16, with citizens and business and land owners
represented as part of the decision process. That is why I did not vote to “throw out” the overlay concept from our Ordinance. I want it revised to allow an Overlay to be used, but only where needed, when needed, with the right definitions and the involvement of those effected.

There are also other key ordinance sections that are needed and desired by citizens in some sections of the county and not
others. I understand that many folks in western Lincoln County
do not desire any additional landscape standards, building
standards, etc.

But at the same time, many in the eastern section, where there
is development pressure have continually asked for more
standards. Look at the new Lowe’s and Walmart on Highway 73 as examples of where new conditions were applied, at citizens’ request, to assure safe road and pedestrian access and achieve long lasting building design.

It is my job as a newly elected commissioner to try and shape
our Ordinances so that we do not place unnecessary restrictions and conditions on areas that don’t need it, but do allow appropriate conditions to be put into place where they are needed.

I sought office to try and bridge the divide that exists between
sections of this county. I understand that our citizens in the
western part of the county want no new restrictions. But they
need to understand that those areas under development
pressure need to have growth managed more effectively than in the past.

And people in the eastern part of the county with its
development and infrastructure pressures, need to understand
that we cannot inflict the standards they need on the rural and
slower developing western part of the county. It is my job, and
that of my fellow commissioners, working with county staff, to try to achieve the flexibility in our documents and our decisions to meet those diverse goals.

I have heard you loud and clear. Now please give us a chance to try to achieve these differing objectives to the best of our ability for all citizens in all sections of the county. If we cannot achieve these objectives, then it is fair to vilify us. But as I said
previously, this is a considerable effort and it requires patience, understanding, common sense and good communication between everyone.

But in the big picture, if the people in this county continue this
divide and do not start working together to improve our focus at a higher level, to strengthen our economy, diversify our tax base and train our workforce for the future, than other counties and states will succeed in attracting the businesses and jobs that we so desperately need. Our job together is tough enough
competing with other counties, states and countries, especially in this economy.

We do not need to fight amongst ourselves. We need to work together to understand and bridge this gap and best guide our future.”

Thanks, George, for taking the time to write this letter of
explanation. Again, I reiterate the best position for
commissioners to take is to take thoroughfare overlay districts
and throw the document – and the idea – in the garbage can.

Like Randy said, “it would only add another layer of development
regulations.”

My question is, does Lincoln County really need that? I await
your responses at mayhew.jon@gmail.com.

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