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23 <br />4. Conservation easements/open space restrictions on privately owned land <br />are difficult to enforce. Even with a homeowners association, homeowners, <br />generally do not monitor their neighbor's yards for compliance with <br />conservation requirements. Landowners are less likely to violate provisions <br />of conservation easements/open .space reservations on individual lots <br />owned in common by all landowners in the development and landowners <br />are more likely to take action against such a violation if the land is held in <br />common. <br />5. Privately owned open space is enjoyed by the private landowner and does <br />not provide for larger passive recreational areas for the entire <br />neighborhood. (Fails to meet the flexible development objective to <br />provide for the active and passive recreational needs of county <br />residents, including implementation of the Master Recreation & Parks <br />Plan.) <br />5. The conservation option, in general, does not provide/protect any more <br />open space (primary and/or secondary conservation areas) than would be <br />provided by a conventional subdivision. (Fails to meet the flexible <br />development objective to encourage the preservation and <br />improvement of habitat for various forms of wildlife and to create new <br />woodlands through natural succession and reforestation where <br />appropriate.) Typically, the open space provided consists of flood plains, <br />stream buffers (in developments located within drinking water supply <br />watersheds), areas where the soils are not suitable for septic systems and <br />in required setback areas. Subdivision regulations are already designed to <br />protect those areas from development. <br />Staff then prepared proposed amendments and the committee invited eleven <br />(11) surveyors and developers who are active in Orange County to meet with the <br />committee and staff to comment on the proposed revisions. (The attachement <br />"Mailing List" lists surveyors and devlepers who .were notified. Two surveyors <br />attended that meeting. Both surveyors commented that the conservation option <br />offers no .incentives to provide more open space than what would be restricted <br />from development within a conventional subdivision. The Ordinance Review <br />Committee revised it's recommendation based on the surveyors comments <br />before submitting options for review of the full Planning Board. <br />The options presented to the board were 1) to delete the conservation option <br />and combine the desirable aspects of that option with the cluster option to <br />become the conservation-cluster option; or 2) to amend the conservation <br />option provisions to require that front and side yard setback areas not be <br />counted toward open space requirements unless those areas contain significant <br />primary or secondary conservation areas and the conservation area is at least <br />g:\may99ph\flexdev.not\5-13-99Vc1 <br />