(GREAT FALLS) The Cascade County Planning Division released the 2019 Zoning Regulations Revisions.
Although the document was last revised in June 2018, there is no required revision cycle.
Public works deputy director Ian Payton says there were many areas that were of concern.
“In that revision there is a variety of areas that were a concern, things that we could improve upon, modify, make things easier for people, and a better planning document to fit the land use and landscape within Cascade County,” Payton said.
Some of the revisions were internally driven meaning someone on the board found a need a to make one section clearer.
Other times revisions can be citizen-initiated.
Payton says one of the main proposals and changes to the regulations was on existing agricultural zoned districts.
We are proposing splitting it up to two mixed-use districts with minimum lot sizes of either 40 or 20 acres. We are also proposing to rezone the Black Eagle area too primarily mix-use. Both of those changes are designed to reduce the amount of nonconforming properties and align proposed land uses with existing land uses in the area,” Payton said.
Payton says both changes are designed to reduce the amount of nonconforming properties and align proposed land uses with existing land uses in the area.
“That and some of the other changes we’ve gone through is to make our document better align with the growth policy that the county has. In addition, adding clarity with our definitions and aligning it better with some of the state laws with MCA. We felt the need that kind of tidying up our document in its format to make it more readable and more user friendly was warranted,” Payton said.
The board will take public comment during an upcoming meeting which will be on February 19th at 9 a.m.
