Zoning matters dominated the quarterly joint meeting involving Emporia city and Lyon County commissioners Wednesday.
Commissioners discussed the status of city and county zoning regulations in light of work by Urban Collaborative to propose a unified comprehensive plan. During the meeting, Lyon County Planning and Zoning Director Sam Seeley told commissioners and staff the regulations aren’t consistent, and Urban Collaborative has offered to create a new set of regulations. Seeley says the end result should be a better set of regulations for city and county residents.
Emporia city consultant and former assistant city manager Jim Witt says this could mean a total change in approach when it comes to zoning regs.
Witt says he is in favor of the plan. However, there will need to be an extensive period of education for city and county staff and residents in the future.
Seeley believes the new plan would be very attractive to contractors for future expansion in the Lyon County area.
In general terms, this would shift the zoning focus from height maximums, minimum lot widths and minimum parking requirements to height and lot size minimums and maximums as well as shared parking provisions. Form-based zoning also looks at building placement and a structure’s physical form as opposed to what the general property use will be.
In other business, commissioners had a status report on the runway expansion project for the Municipal Airport. Assistant City Manager Lane Massey says the city is negotiating with nearby landowners to acquire property rights so the runway can be expanded, although he says it could cost between $1.5 million and $2 million. The city is looking to acquire up to 14 acres of property and has been discussing a possible extension for well over a decade to accommodate 75 percent of aircraft. The Federal Aviation Administration is offering a 90 percent reimbursement for land acquisition services.
The City-County Planning Commision and Emporia Board of Zoning Appeals merger was also discussed in correlation with the Urban Collaborative proposal.
