List of land uses: permitted uses only v. prohibited uses only

[luluhead]

I made some changes to the list of permitted and conditional uses. Had two hearings in front of the Planning Board. After they voted, one PB member had to give a 10 minute libertarian speech that instead of telling people what they can do, we should tell them what they cannot do. I think it is a bad idea. First, we would be fixing what is not broken. Second, just recently we had an issue in one of the PUD's which says no parking garages, so they are attempting to be approved for a parking deck. Things like that will be happening with uses if we just had the list of prohibited uses.

When I bring this in front of the City Council, I would like to elaborate on this. If someone has a link to some research, good opinions, I would greatly appreciate it.

[jwhitty]

Show the PB member your jurisdiction's hourly lawyer rate and ask the PB member if they would like for said lawyer/law firm to be in constant litigation or on an indefinite bill rate. You should probably contact your jurisdiction's attorney to allow them to explain the potential problems and the impact of such an ordinance with respect to case law and established procedure. That outta be bleed edge enough to calm things down.

I would be interested to see if there was/is a home rule styled zoning ordinance. As you noted, it would have to be a challenge to justify denial for something not allowed, but in keeping with the language of the ordinance.

[dvdneal]

I've got no research, but it doesn't sound like that would work unless you put a bunch of controls on form which defeats the libertines idea. You could always show how the code combines uses like lumping all retail into one category (I just did that with mine). I just explained that we don't really care what type of retail it is, let's just let them all go in commercial zones. My commission seemed to like that idea.

Good luck

[Suburb Repairman]

I've got no research, but it doesn't sound like that would work unless you put a bunch of controls on form which defeats the libertines idea. You could always show how the code combines uses like lumping all retail into one category (I just did that with mine). I just explained that we don't really care what type of retail it is, let's just let them all go in commercial zones. My commission seemed to like that idea.

Good luck

That would be my recommendation--look at aggregating uses in your permitted use table. We did something very similar to dvdneal, knocking our permitted uses table down to 5 pages from 16 and beefing up the definitions of the uses listed. Made life much easier for everyone involved.

It sounds like your Commissioner is really looking for ways to simplify your code, and that is a good place to start. Also, if you're comfortable, there are some good property rights-based arguments for form-based codes as giving more use flexibility in exchange for better design that often gets property owners a stronger return on investment.