Agenda - 09-09-2013 - C3 - Laserfiche WebLink

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Attachment 4 28 Michael Harvey From: Rich Shaw Sent: Monday, July 01, 2013 10:14 AM To: Michael Harvey Cc: Marabeth Carr; David Stancil Subject: RE: Peer Review - proposed UDO Text Amendment Michael, Thank you for the opportunity to review and comment on draft UDO language to address a concern over a lack of public involvement with "governmental uses." We agree that the general public, and especially all neighboring landowners, should be made aware of plans to develop new facilities on County -owned land. DEAPR has a long history of involving the public in the development of its park master plans. So we are pleased to see that the proposed rules would not require additional meetings in cases where a master plan (or phased development plan) has already been approved by the County for the subject property. For all new parks and public recreation areas DEAPR already utilizes a community -based process. We start with an information meeting and design charette(s) to gather input on what the citizens of Orange County would like to see in their parks. We typically include neighborhood representatives on the park master plan committee and also hold open meetings for the public to review and comment on the draft plan. Typically this public process is a series of 5 -7 meetings over a six- to nine -month period. We have identified three provisions in the proposed guidelines for holding Neighborhood Educational Meetings (Section 2.24.1.) where we find a difference in DEAPR's current practice: 1. DEAPR sends out invitations through the regular mail rather than by certified mail, which costs $5.00 per address (not in our budget) 2. DEAPR conducts its own public meetings and typically invites a Planning staff representative to participate. We do not intend to "contract" that out to the Planning and Inspections Department. Perhaps the UDO could provide some guidelines for the meeting format and agenda that could be used by DEAPR and other departments that wish to conduct their own meetings. 3. DEAPR would like more clarity on what kinds of site development would not require a public education meeting. There are many small projects handled "in- house" by DEAPR's Parks grounds staff (to save time and money) rather than contracting the work out to a private firm. Many of those projects occur during the winter months when the workload is less. The proposed rules may cause problems for some projects, requiring that the timeframe be drawn out for several weeks... possibly forcing their cancelation altogether. If you have any questions or would like to discuss please feel free to contact us. Marabeth Carr, Landscape Architect Department of Environment, Agriculture, Parks and Recreation 306A Revere Rd / PO Box 8181 / Hillsborough NC 27278 / 919 - 245 -2516 / htti): / /www.co.orange.nc.us Rich Shaw, Land Conservation Manager Orange County Department of Environment, Agriculture, Parks and Recreation 306A Revere Rd / PO Box 8181 / Hillsborough NC 27278 / 919 - 245 -2514 / http: / /www.co.orange.nc.us