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Show Land Use Code Review Planned U :t I I ' V 4? J ! ' 71. l ?n ' ff' City Attorney Michael McCoy Steps are being taken to review and overhaul Park City's Land Management Code following a joint executive session last Wednesday of the planning commission and city council. Mayor Jack Green appointed an ad hoc committee at Thursday's Thurs-day's council meeting to undertake under-take the project, which will involve reassessing "inadequacies "inadequa-cies in certain areas" of the code. The committee will consist of the entire council, with planning commission liaison Bob Wells serving as chairman. According to City Attorney Michael McCoy, who recommended recom-mended the review at the executive session, the code as it is now written is not as specific or clear as it should be. "I think when any agency of government takes people's rights away and limits their ability to do what they please, the law should be written so people can tell what they can and cannot do," said McCoy. "As a matter of fairness, some ordinances need to be niade more specific so people know up front what they can do before they spend a lot of money." McCoy also noted that all of Park City's ordinances are more complicated than they need to be. "I don't think ordinances should be incomprehensible," he said. "Too many of the ordinances ordinan-ces are not necessary and not even legal." The attorney estimates that one-fifth to one-quarter of the town's ordinances are already covered by state laws and should be eliminated entirely. "You don't put into a city ordinance what is already in the state law," he said. "Why do it?" An undercurrent of speculation preceeded the Wednesday executive execu-tive session, which was closed to the press and public, that the attorney and council planned to "come down hard" on the planning commission for overstepping over-stepping the bounds of their authority." McCoy told the Record, however, how-ever, that his recommendations would not involve changing the intent of the Land Management Code or change the way the planning commission operates. He said he "did not detect a lot of disagreement" at Wednesday's meeting over his recommendation to overhaul the ordinances. - "I don't think the role of the planning commission would change," he said. "The planning commission will do substantially what they're doing now." McCoy said the only changes in substance he would like to see in the ordinances involve clarifying what is a "permitted use" in a particular zone and perhaps changing the boundaries of some zoning districts based on changes in the mkae-up of the town. 'As city attorney, I would say the planning commission can do just about anything the council wants," said McCoy. "As an administrative technician, however, how-ever, I think the planning commission is doing some things it shouldn't." The attorney said the planning commission currently considers many items as conditional uses that might be handled more efficiently as permitted uses, which require only approval of the building inspector. "I don't think the planning commission should spend time deciding whether a business goes one place or another, " he said. "They shouldn't be in a position of, in effect, issuing business licenses." Although commission chairman Burnis Watts maintains this is not being done, said McCoy, the actions of the planning commission commis-sion should, in any case, be clarified. "You can't deny something on generalizations. You have to be specific," the attorney said. "If a business comes into a commercial area and their business is selling goods, nobody can stop them. There is no rational basis." McCoy said revision of the Land Management Code need not be a "high priority" item since the current ordinances are at least "adequate." "It depends on the council's priorities," he said. "There is no need to rush to great change." |