Updated Packet for Moody Activitiy Zones (MAZ) @ GLPC Work 2015-11-23

Details of massive revisions to the proposal for changes to the Moody Activity Zoning Districts, sent by County Planner Jason Davenport to the Greater Lowndes Planning Commission (GLPC) and the Lowndes County Commissioners on 11 November 2015, in advance of the GLPC’s 23 November 2015 Work Session and 30 November 2015 Regular Session. He copied LAKE due to an open records request from Gretchen Quarterman. The whole thing is on the LAKE website.

Especially interesting are two slides apparently intended to finally the question on everyone’s mind of which developers are these changes for?

Why are we here?

  • To improve the MAZ Regulations
  • 2012 Rezoning Case & Text Amendment
  • County Leadership (Direction)(lnitial Goal June 2015)
  • County Planner (Implementation and Support)
  • Response to Development Issues with Private Property
  • Owners
    • Dwellings destroyed by tornadoes, denial of dwellings and accessory dwellings, denial of replacement/improvement of older manufactured housing, noise related complaints, denial of manufactured houses vs. site built houses, and denial of dividing land for families
  • Better Balance Private Property Owner Rights vs. Moody AFB Protection

We are not here to . . .

  • We are not here to benefit a developer
  • We are not here to benefit a small group of developers
  • We are not here to benefit a large group of developers
  • We are not here to create loopholes for developers
  • Primary Target Market: Existing Property Owners, Citizens, and Tenants trying to maintain or improve their existing property

That would be great!

Although I don’t know whether existing property owners really like being a target of the county government. They didn’t seem to like it when the Tax Assessors targetted them.

Questions remain about these this MAZ text amendment rationale, such as:

  • If it’s not about developers, what’s this “Response to Development Issues with Private Property”?
  • Who is this “County Leadership”?

Pardon my scepticism, but I know I’m not alone in having some doubts still as to why really are these changes being proposed. After the infamous 12 November 2012 Lowndes County Commission Work Session when the then-chairman asked a developer to speak but didn’t ask any opponents to speak, and the next day at the Regular Session County Planner Jason Davenport said the developer had asked for that version of the MAZ changes, TEX-2012-02, to be tabled, and at the 26 November 2015 GLPC meeting Davenport first talked about density requirements. At the next Lowndes County Commission Work Session, Davenport explicitly linked to a rezoning case on the same agenda. A rezoning case by someone who mentioned a rezoning in 2007, which was when he got $130,000 in road construction labor from the Commission because of “an unforeseen Department of Transportation requirement regarding a costly intersection improvement.”

The Chamber has been opposing this thing since December 2012.

Inquiring minds would like to know who this “County Leadership” is, and what about that developer and other developers?

-jsq