Orange County NC Website
During the discussions with Orange County staff, Durham staff repeatedly acknowledged r 0 <br />the timing issue that the City had directed them to incorporate in any of these agreements, <br />Orange County staff indicated that they understood this requirement. <br />Durham staff acknowledged the requested different timeframe requested by Orange <br />County in presentations to Durham's Joint City-County Planning Committee and both the <br />City and County elected boards, as well as in the agenda materials associated with the <br />agreement. Based on past direction and our existing agreements with other,jurisdictions, <br />we maintained the 21 day timeframe that has been committed to our development <br />community. <br />Irr setting these timeframes, we have never assumed that every site plan or plat would be <br />presented to elected officials. The agreement that we approved, just as our agreements <br />with other jurisdictions, covers all development proposals within the area that would <br />require an apl;roval t',uough the Planning Department. This would include miner cite <br />plans that are approved by staff as well as snore substantive proposals that w°ould have to <br />go before a governing body, Those items that would go before a governing body (plan <br />amendments, rezonings, use permits, and major site plans) would require a longer <br />timeframe before the item could get on a City or County agenda; for those items, Orange <br />County would be able to take advantage of the longer timeframe required for our <br />respective agenda processes to give the Board of Commissioners an opportunity to <br />formalize comments that would go back to the other governing body. On those cases <br />where the issues are purely administrative (addressing technical compliance with <br />ordinances), however, we do not anticipate that the item would require review by an <br />elected body in which case we do not see that the 21 day review period should be an <br />issue. <br />We continue to want to coordinate our planning efforts in this corridor that is important <br />to all of our ,jurisdictions. Ihope that this letter helps explain the position taken by the <br />City and County of Durham in approving the courtesy review agreement with the <br />timeframes that we did. <br />Sincerely, <br />tA~/ Y~~~u""v <br />Ellen Reckhow, Chairman <br />Durham County Board of Commissioners <br />xc: William Bell, Mayor, City of Durham <br />Durham County Board of Commissioners <br />Mike Ruffin, Durham County Manager <br />Frank Duke, Durham City-County Planning Director <br />