Area Plan Commission (apc) - Regular Meeting

Ready, guys? Yep. Okay. I call this meeting of the Brown County Area Planning Commission to order on May 26, 2026 at 6 p.m. Roll call.

Carol Bowden.

Present.

Tim Allen.

Here.

Jane Gore.

Here.

Randy Jones.

Here.

Do I have a motion for approval of the minutes from April 28, 2026? So moved.

I'll second.

Any discussion? Roll call.

Randy Jones?

Yes.

Karen Hammond? Abstain. Andy Boyles?

Yes.

Kyle Deckard? Abstain. Carol Bowden?

Yes. We don't have any old business and we don't have any new business. And before we get to the next section, we have a microphone here and it's going to be projecting a little bit loud so we need to make sure we only have one person speaking at a time so that we don't have this big noise factor for people who can't hear. Yes, sir.

Can we move it further away from me?

I dare in charge of it, not me.

You put it in the middle.

I'm just saying, I'm probably the least to need it.

That's just where Eric put it, so wherever you need it.

All right. And with that, we initiate the joint meeting with the Brown County Planning Commission along with the Brown County Board of Commissioners to discuss the preparation, adoption, or any other proposed options that the Board or the Commission may suggest regarding the Brown County Comprehensive Plan. And apparently also discuss decrease in setback requirements in the Lake Residential Districts.

and that will be after the commissioners adjourn their meeting.

Okay. Thank you.

Can I call our meeting to order? Okay. Call the Brown County Board of Commissioners meeting to order. Those present, Kevin, Patrick, and Tim Clark.

Is Ron going to make it, or do I know?

I haven't heard. He's planning on it.

Okay. I used to know it was planned, like he could make it or whatever. Yep. Yep.

Okay, so where are we starting?

All right. Well, let me summarize. Last month we presented kind of a case for change. We talked about the process, our concerns with the cop plan, identified suggestions, different concerns, issues. If you recall, kind of went through the handout. And then we came out of that, and the idea was, okay, give us a way forward. And so this is really the scope of work for an amendment, starting with a prototype proof of concept in Van Buren.

So if you like, we can go through what this includes.

But is there any questions left over from last month you want to discuss?

Yeah, I do. RIA, is that just an acronym, or does that actually stand for something? Do you know?

It stands for something.

Randell, Ernst, Berger, and Simmons.

Thank you.

Are they circular? A diameter?

Let's try the comedy.

He's not going to do well on the stand-up stage. He didn't land.

Yeah, you did that. I wrote that down. If I got it, I didn't bring it with me. They're the ones that did the nationals plan. Yeah, okay. And had an extensive number of meetings and reviews and took time. It was like a nine-month process. James probably couldn't have been longer than that. He probably went to a lot of those meetings. It was a very thorough process. So on this initial...

A plan update that we have here. Was there a charge for this, Tim? No. No charge? Nope. So they did this out of free gratis?

Yes. Okay. I provided the detail, supporting information, saying, hey, here's what we're looking at. Provided additional information that RDC worked on for months, worked on a community engagement plan. So a lot of the concepts were already there. I just basically reformatted what they did and said, hey, does it make sense to do a prototype for us? Do a prototype in an area and go from there. And I said, sure. I'd be glad to put something together for you.

Okay. That's all I got.

Okay. And, folks, for context, again, this is a proposed outline for an amendment, amendment to the plan, and that falls under the commissioner's responsibility to do it. But, of course, you guys got to accept. Do we want to accept this amendment or not? Amendment to the cop plan.

To our existing comp plan?

Yes, to the draft that you guys presented to the commissioners.

So the draft. So this. To that. We would amend this document?

So in essence, basically, if I'm understanding this correctly, what we've asked is they've given us gratis on putting in our. You have to use regular. Okay. Freebie. Okay.

Which we know nothing's free. You'll get yelled at if you use those polysyllabics. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Okay.

I'm getting a hard time for using English, sorry. One voice at a time, please.

So they did it for free.

In essence, and this would be their proposal as to looking at how they would go about putting together an amendment to the new comp plan to enhance it based on this process that they've identified here. And it would be done on a township by township level.

cut okay so we would accept the existing with amendments with a with an actual way forward to continuously updated every year?

Updated as necessary, I would assume, right?

One of the things that we've talked about with what we've wanted out of this is something that could easily be updated and be used and be known. So does this just add to bringing more of that input, more of that county input, too? So before a process, a zoning change is required, it would be a community meeting?

Mm-hmm. Well, no, I don't know about the follow-on, right? So, again, the recommendation here or the proposal is go and, again, this is a conversation I just had with Kenny over there. There are aspects of each one of the townships that we have in this county that are different. Hanlon Township does not Van Buren. Now, there are aspects of it, agricultural, logging, things of that nature there. But if you look at the – and I was just discussing this with a friend of mine this weekend. He's like, oh, yeah, this is Brunkhead. That's beautiful. I said, yes. I said, but if you travel not more than 25 minutes south and go to Van Buren, it looks absolutely nothing like Hamlin Township. Everybody's got their own set of needs. In Hanlon Township, you have homes that are much closer. Van Buren, you're lucky to bump into another driveway or a goat along the way because the geography lends itself there. So I think that's why the recommendation was to look at it and say, well, can we make a proposal on that? The other staggering thing about this, if you looked at these two things here, is that that Jackson Township, and I believe part of Washington, is where your LMIs are, where you're talking about your low to moderate income coming out. Whereas if you go out towards Van Buren and up Hamelin, you don't have that. So, again, the geography to me means that you've got people like where I live, where I grew up. My parents' parents were blue-collar workers, right? Drove every day back and forth to Indianapolis. You still have people doing that. I have my sister that's worked in Indianapolis, drove back and forth every day in Indianapolis. It's changed now with the dynamics of COVID, but still, their need is different. I think we have different needs.

This is a proposal for them to conduct meetings and assessments and then write an amendment to the existing comprehensive plan. They've done something for free. They've scoped the work they would do for pay. They gave us a free estimate. Like, this is not something ready to be admitted. That's correct. It is outlining what would create it.

I think this describes what they're proposing as a process. Correct. Okay.

But if you look in there and you read it, it also says that they are willing to go through this process with Van Buren Township in the hopes that if it satisfies both the commissioners and the ABC, they would do the subsequent townships.

I guess to Andy.

No, you, please.

I'm just going to say that is what you're proposing that except what we have as an interim fix with a clear plan for, and then we're starting with Van Buren to... make this more robust or that we're putting on hold. And I ask because I was trying to find this, Kayla, but I thought there was just something passed at the state level that was about comprehensive plans and zoning and what you could do over the state requirements. And it was kind of like, as of whatever date, if your comprehensive plan says it's allowed, then it's allowed. Or you have like a very particular process you have to go through.

Is this in 1210? I'm not sure. All the other amendments are possible.

I saw this within the last month or so, I feel like, since the last meeting. I'll look into that. But it was kind of like if you wanted exemption from the state-level zoning, then there was a process you had to go through.

And you're talking about the bill that just passed, H-E-A-12. Maybe that's what she's saying, 12-10.

But I'm just saying one of the things was like if your comprehensive plan, I'm paraphrasing greatly here, but it's like if your comprehensive plan says it's allowed, then... It's allowed. And our current comprehensive plan puts us in a real bad position if that's the intention of the state.

Kayla, that's something you probably ought to make sure Dave looks at. I'm sure Dave's all over that.

So you might want to... We've read through most of that bill together to see where it applies.

Okay.

We have another interjection.

Yeah.

And you grandfathered it in that they couldn't... Ours...

established before that what 2018 or something like that so it's stood yeah so here's my question I love the idea the concept sounds great mm-hmm what do we do okay so we do Van Buren then what because we can't pass anything for just Van Buren Township right like it would be a county-wide Ordinance we don't have District specific ordinances, right? Right unless it's a lake then the lake area has some some funny stuff, which But yeah, but you don't yeah, I'm gonna see what I'm what I'm Mike where I'm getting with this is Did they give you any kind of idea what this would cost for the for the initial deal with Van Buren Township? No, okay. I'm wondering if Does it make sense to just focus on a district when it sounds like that's going to all of a sudden cost us four times as much if we have to repeat that before we can actually update our plan? We'll have to do that four more times, or three more times. So I'd love to see the initial proposal. I'm not sure how they're breaking down. I love studying the individual. I totally agree. The needs and people and What's happening in the different areas of the county are different. I think there's certain areas that are more primed for growth for our immediate needs, like multifamily housing and things like that. I'm just, I guess we could get, we didn't ask any of the other companies to give us a quarter of a comp plan we asked them to give us a less than comprehensive comprehensive plan but i'm wondering as far as cost goes does that push this out for a year if we can only do one a year say it's 30 grand if we can only do one district a year would it make sense to push it out four years like is it going to change will van buren have changed by the time we get the other counties or the other Taking care of districts. It's not district, though, is it?

It's a township. They identified three months for a township. Two meetings, three months for a township. A sub-area plan. What is this term? Three months. Conducting this. Oh, okay. It's starting in three months.

About the year is the budget. Right. All we can afford is one per year.

It doesn't matter. And the subsequent cost of each additional. Right.

That would be, because I guess we're asking for a, It's like the dope man. He gives you the first hit for free. But if we can't afford the rest, then we've wasted another. You know what I mean?

I wouldn't quite call it that. You're looking at three months. It's a proof of concept.

Sure.

Okay? And so when they have those two meetings, it's not like we're not there observing what they're doing. And they're documenting methodology, and you can observe how their process is going. And we say, gee whiz, we need to make some adjustments. We like this, we like that. And then we standardize what that approach is. At that point, we've got three more townships to go. Can you do more than one at a time? Could you stagger them? Sure. Let's see how it goes. But once we have that first one under our belt and we say that's exactly what we want to see happen, these other townships, then we lift and shift on what that strategy is. So a year, it depends. What do you want to do? I don't think.

I mean, worst case scenario. I'm sorry, I'm not saying it opposed. I think it's an important question.

I'm just saying that's the structure. And so, and again, when you get the proposal, it's not necessarily, it's not a here's what we can do. If you like the first one, here's what we can do, you know, for the other two. It's not a bait and switch, I don't think. I mean, they could walk away after the first one.

Which would be lost. I mean, it would be a pointless exercise.

No, it wouldn't. No. If I'm looking at this and myself and I'm going down this path, I am myself, just like the approach that we're planning on taking and looking at different approaches. I would sit there and say anything and everything that you do is county property. It belongs to us. In the sense that they give us this grottos, and we go down this path, and it gives them here, right? Well, this isn't – To me, it's not lost. Wait a minute. This isn't free.

We're going to have to – One person at a time, please.

Yeah. This was free. This doctor.

This was free.

The rest of it's on – Their map.

Their outline. Their outline. Yeah. Their concept.

Right.

That's what was grottos.

Yeah, yeah.

Well, worst case scenario, their estimate was three months, correct? Yes, for a township. So it would be a year.

Yeah. If we went with that schedule. If you did sequentially.

Well, yeah, that's what I'm saying, Tim, if we did that. Yeah. I mean, that's kind of, if you would just put that with some simple math and that works out to that. We don't know it, though.

Sorry.

Correct.

So, forgive my, I was in the car business for a long time, so contractual... like working a deal. If I were working this as a car deal and I had a $20,000 car, I just showed you a $5,000 car that you got to pay for four times. That's all. I want to make sure that if we don't want to just be able to afford Van Buren, we want to be able to afford the whole thing. And the other question is what we keep saying Van Buren, has that just been used as an example? Or is there something specific about that township that is attractive to do our first one on?

It basically covers in here. It says it offers the most unique set of opportunities from the diversity of the geography to the, again, think about it. It is probably one of the largest areas of agricultural along with timbering as part of that. And then you have basically in that Van Buren area where you have a huge i would say a gathering of those people who are are working and driving from here to columbus is that part of it so you've got a blend and a mix probably of of probably what we call the most representative of the various things that are available or

economics in the county there and you have an exception of tourism right you have a volunteer fire department it's knocked on every door I think in that in that township when the tornado went through so they're very very active volunteer fire department that's kind of a hub that fire departments a hub for meetings and that you know they have and they can promote that to the fire department so I think we get the most people engaged in a short period of time using that starting off with Van Buren

So it is specific. Did they determine that Van Buren was best? I don't know. We did. You did?

Yes.

And I'm just asking, because I do live in Van Buren Township, and we do have an amazing... Southsiders are the best. There were 35 dudes with tractors and chainsaws.

Kenny, don't agree with me.

I've seen it, man. When you want community, that's community.

And I will throw the same thing back at you when we had 12 inches of snow on the ground. In essence, they each have their set of attributes and characteristics to me. I mean, again, when I went through this and looked at that, I mean, Hamlin Township out of that from a standpoint, if we're talking, again, you look at numbers and data, the LMI in Hamlin Township, There's no – we're going to have to shovel the – bear the burden on that one ourselves as far as any cost, anything that we want to go down in this approach, right, because there's nothing that we can go after from grant support and that kind of stuff.

Does breaking it out into that sub-area aspect open up funding for the townships that have – Yeah, it mentions it here. Okay. I get that that feature is true. I was just curious if that's actually how the funding agencies view it. If they say, we'll pay for this portion that's going to feed into your comprehensive plan because it's only for this area that meets our income requirements.

The way that I understand it, that's only for economic development. So we're not going to get a planning grant.

Oh, no.

with our lmi numbers just because we unless we kick cordry sweetwater completely out they wouldn't do it we asked yeah they're not going to take over so that's what i'm saying so yeah i understand that approach but that's what i was curious about does that approach actually help here because i guess in my mind i would have thought the most immediate would be washington township going to columbus and then hamlin or wherever going north you know what i mean that's that was That's the most complex.

It's more complex, but that's where the immediate opportunity.

We've got sewer conversations happening in multiple places up there.

That's the most complex. I think Hamilton's probably... The least diverse, you've got the lakes.

Is Cordray in Hamblin? Is that how it's? Yes. I wasn't sure if that was it.

Washington, good Lord, that's Nashville, Nambone, Belmont, Brown County State Park, Monroe Reservoir, Yellowwood State Forest and like, Hoosier National Forest.

Right, but we can't do anything with the National Forest, but the rest of those areas are where we can, that's our infrastructure.

Right, it's a lot more dynamic.

Nobody's been able to get on 135 this week. You know what I mean? So we need a little help from the state before that can do much.

Well, and then once we get, like I said, once we get one under our belt, then I think we get a lot more insight as to what we learned from that, and then we can strategize where do we want to jump off next. I don't think you have to do them sequentially. I don't know why you couldn't do one or more in parallel or stagger. So don't know. Don't know what that looks like. Don't know what this is going to look like until we see it. And then once we see it, we like the result, we want to tailor it to the other townships, and we can adjust and talk about it.

the whole concept, again, it's a proof of concept, so can we take this and make it work?

I mean, I'll speak for myself, but I think the rest of the board, I've heard them say similar things. I mean, I know we're here talking about this because we're like, we just want to see a path forward. When we get these requests from residents and businesses and we're saying, you know, our current framework, the comprehensive plan, the zoning work, doesn't give us a way forward, especially as the APC, like we're What is it? BZA is quasi-judicial. They have a lot more leeway in what they decide. We're supposed to go back to the comprehensive plan and the zoning ordinance. So we get in a bind when it's like, we see the merits of what you're asking, but... How are we supposed to allow this, you know? So I think our worry and what we want is the comprehensive plan has to move forward and then it's a whole other can of worms with the zoning ordinance. The thing that actually says now this is what you can do in this zoning area. This is what, you know, that's even more complex. And so... Like, if this is the best option and that's gonna take a year, okay, great, let's get moving on it. Let's know that it's gonna happen, but that's still another year then where we're, not even a year, more than a year where we're in this same problem, essentially. That's our concern. But we just want to see something. None of us are opposed to more input. That's what we wanted the first time. The money just wasn't there to do it.

So my next, just cursory, I just got this document. I didn't have a chance to review it before the meeting, and that's my fault. I do have a question. This company, who is this company? Where did they come from?

They did the town of Nashville's. comprehensive plan. And they're now working on their own ordinance.

Do you think it's something like before, or is there a conflict of interest before we put it out to bid to multiple companies? Do we need to open up this approach and get another idea? Like get a second price check? You know what I mean? Or is it we can do it, but we've got to do it with them and their way? I'm just asking. It's a question.

That would be a good one for Dave. Unfortunately, he's not here this evening. So the question is, do we have to advertise? Do you have to advertise for this?

If it's under $50,000, that's our discretion in it, Kevin. Again, I have to be very careful about that because you also have to look at it as, from a statutory standpoint, there's three areas. From what I understand, very limited 19, 15, whatever months I've been on board here. 17 months. Professional services are not necessarily governed by a, I believe if I'm not mistaken, not necessarily governed by a requirement to go out to bid. Okay? So professional services are provided, engineering services, planning services, and those kinds of things.

So it would be more on the individual office or department?

It would be more left on the individual to just kind of say, again, but again, my behavior has been is I'm right there along with you. I like to have a second eye, set of eyes, look at this and say, the validity of the concept is good, and here's where we believe we can be, right?

Kayla, do you remember what we came up with? with how we handled the situation when we were putting the comprehensive plan together. Do you remember what Dave said?

We had to put an RFP out.

You did? Yeah. Required to? Mm-hmm. Okay.

And here's another, and a little back story as to why I'm so, I ask a lot of questions. The other company that we previously chose, that process looked like we looked at several different companies and heard what they had to say and then this board made a decision of what we felt was the best and then we had a steering team that went over every this sounds autonomous like this sounds like rea is going to do this on their own or is this does this still go through will we set up another steering team for these meetings in there okay it's in there okay a little autonomy can be good for speed though Not disagreeing. Not disagreeing at all. Again, I want to make sure that there's no appearance of for all of our benefit that you are not telling us you use this company. Before, when the... When someone comes up to me and asks, why in the world, why did you guys pick that company over, well, I could say, because when we listened to them and we heard what they had to say, we waited and that's the decision we made. It wasn't necessarily made on price, it was made on final product. I want to be able to say the same.

I want to bring up one point, because I don't know how far people have gone through this document, but the project schedule. Phase one, project initiation, background review, mythology, three months. Phase two, Van Buren Township prototype, whatever plan, which I don't even know how to, sub-area plan, three months, approximately six months. Just the one township. 6.0. does, there's no way that they're going to do that.

I guarantee if they're charging $150 an hour, it's going to be more than what we've already spent if it's six months, truly. If the pricing model is the same, it goes... We couldn't afford to do this and, right? It was either this or now if we can secure the funding, this is awesome. Because this could be ongoing. Like this could be every five years. We go back if we like. community meetings. We say, hey, how do you like it?

Yeah, that's something that will have to be determined. Frequency.

I'm saying ability, though, is there. That adds in that modularity and that this makes this living. It's not just going to sit on a shelf. It can be changed. Part of this we wanted was we wanted to say it must be reviewed and X amount of, I think Dave was checking on.

It's recommended every three to five years.

So I think we just pass a of the comp plans done, whether you want to or not?

I think we're getting way ahead of ourselves here.

We're getting way ahead of ourselves. Let me kind of summarize the process here. When you guys, if you look at the IC code, you know, I guess we can follow up with Dave. Went through the IC code, and I went through with our attorneys. When you presented the, the APC presents the plan for the commissioners that we can reject, approve, disapprove, or just do nothing. And we chose not to accept it. At that point, it's up to us to identify comments and proposed amendments. That's what we worked on kind of last year. What kind of, how would we want this thing to go? And that's where the RDC, we tried to get funding from OCRA, and that's where they shot us out of the water on the... We're at 40.4%. We couldn't carve out any of the other high district LMI's. They said, you're not getting the $60,000 for the copper plant. And we tried that, and that's where the LMI's came from, from the townships. Then we tried to get the Rural Empowerment Development Grant from OCRA to help us develop a community engagement model, but then they didn't do it because we didn't have a community engagement capability, which is what we were asking for. So we didn't get that for the RDC. So then they went forward and did. We said, okay, let's come up with a community engagement plan because that was our biggest reason for our concern with the plan is not having the extent of the public involvement that we wanted to have on that plan for us to sign off on this thing. And so then the option was, okay, what would a community engagement model look like? And then how would you do it? How could you phase that in? That's where it came to this. I reached out to them because I attended several of those Nashville town meetings and saw their work, saw the final plan, saw the nine-month plan, the number of meetings they had. And then they did the Nashville plan, which is going to be kind of incorporated in ours in a little way. We're going to have to reference it, and there's probably a few pages we need to identify here. as far as the county perspective on the Nashville plan, especially when it comes to the annexation thing and their sewer service thing. It's another thing. So our goal here, by statute, is we can amend it. We've got to propose an amendment. And that's what we're doing. This is a proposed amendment. When I reached out to them, I just wanted a sanity check. I don't know anything about planning. I don't know anything about zoning. I don't know how we could go about doing what we all kind of talked about different times to do. And so I said, does it make sense to have some kind of prototype in this and oh by the way here's here's 10 50 pages of facts when it comes to economics and figure that in and then figure out the uniqueness of the different townships and so i gave him a ton of information i think i sent you guys that report and all the links and you can go out and and see all the information you want but the end line is i wanted them to put together a proposal for us and say hey can you put all this here's all the information can you put this into a concept where we can go out and do a prototype a proof of concept in a township and then take that throughout the county and add to it basically it's a sub-area plan would it be an amendment to to the comp plan that's that's where we're at when it comes to The money, the contract, how we would do it. Could we do it as professional services? Do you have to do it for the RFP because it's different for you? Don't know. We're not there yet. We're at the point now is this is our proposed amendment, our way ahead on getting a comp plan that can be developed and something that we'll support as commissioners and vote off on it. So don't know about the money. Don't know how much it's going to cost. Don't know where we...

But again, the conversation that we had the last time around is that's why we're coming here and engaging at that level. Right. Because budgets start in a month, right? And if we're wanting to go through and look at that funding aspect of it, that means something has to happen between now and before October. So it's a conversation with the council, right?

So just for the record, there was no official action taken on this? out of Commissioner's meeting.

No. No.

I just wanted to make that clear for the record. Right.

No one would be required to.

Well, the other thing I'd like some clarification on, too, did we get a non-accept from you guys?

That's what Kayla was asking.

Well, I know how we're asking the same thing in a different way. Did we get a non-accept from you? In the minutes. In your minutes? And Kayla was there. Was that conveyed to us, to you?

I mean, I was always under the impression that – I mean, a public hearing was held at the commissioner's level meeting.

We never heard anything.

Right.

It just – we didn't get an official declaration from you all, either up, down, or not.

That was communicated to Kayla in our meeting. That's in the minutes.

She said we're not moving forward – you weren't moving forward with public hearing. Yeah. Correct. She said – you were saying no –

No formal action was taken. There wasn't a public meeting where the public was invited to come.

Okay. But we know now that you didn't, so you didn't accept it.

I'm sorry. Finish what you said.

Well, so, Tim, if I understand this correctly, REIA has just kind of done this out of free gratis, that they kind of put together a proposal, a process, of one way of approaching this. And, Kevin, I heard what you said, too. If, in fact, that does go through and we do accept that process and follow something like what they're proposing, they're going to have to – this will be open for bidding. if I heard Kayla correctly. Because I think we had to open that up for bidding so other companies could come in, other consultants, contractors, whatever you want to call them, consultants, could come in.

So, again, this is a conversation with Dave because, again, like I said, Again, I am not an IC expert, okay?

I just know how we did it last time.

So last time was because that's because we chose to do it that way, or is that by statute?

By statute, we had to do it that way.

Okay, but as planning commissioners, we agree if we... One person at a time, please. If we agree on this... We're not necessarily agreeing that Rhea is the one who's going to be doing the work. We're just saying we're looking at the process they proposed and it makes sense to us. Or not.

So the commissioners are proposing an amendment to allow for more community engagement? I'm trying to figure out how we pass it.

Well, this is my question. I guess at the end of the day, to Tim's point, it doesn't matter what we write down if they're not going to accept it. And so if the only way they're going to accept any comprehensive plan rewrite, and I don't know if this is what you're saying, but this is totally off the table until new input is collected on whatever timeline and money that takes. That could be two years or five years from now. If that's what they're saying, then we don't, you know, we can figure out if we have to get bids or figure out the exact form, but it's saying go back to the drawing board. Is that what you're, the commissioners are ultimately saying is go back to the drawing board. This is off the table until more input is gathered.

That's the message that was delivered in the last meeting.

Because you're not willing to accept this.

As is, no, we're not.

Unlike, which I, with you I don't love how this finalized okay I don't there I argued in a meeting with Pete like you don't even live here what why are you working you work for us so I'm not thrilled like I know it's incomplete you have not said rather than saying no go back to the drawing board you have said here is a solution to get you to this, which I love. I'm very grateful for. What I had hoped, if they were willing to put this much work in, there had to have been another page right here that had $29.95, three easy payments. I mean, somebody, they've had to have already thought about what they're going to charge us.

I'm sure they have.

So that would be great information to have. That's next step.

Yeah.

But if we pass this amendment.

We're not really passing it. We're just accepting that that's the next step forward.

I thought they were proposing an amendment.

No, no. That had to be voted on. Oh, no, no.

This would be the next step. No. Just think of it as a process, Andy.

I think amendment's the wrong word. Yes, I do too. You never pass the comp plan. You can't amend something that's not passed.

Right, that's where I was confused.

Is there, I mean, Tim, you are intimately familiar with the amount of studies and public input that has been, you know, even if it's not exactly what we would want, there has been a lot of looking and thinking and data. I mean, you referenced 50 pages of data. Like, Surely, there's enough there to come up with something better as a starting point. That if we're going to spend money, we at least get a better plan, a V1, that we can implement while we go through, you know what I mean, like doing something better. I just, I hate sticking with the same crappy comprehensive plan we have and have been stuck with for realistically another two years. Like, at least. It would be how long it would take us

I don't know, I hear what you're saying, and I can commiserate with you, but I don't know how that could be done. There's so many steps that you have to go through.

Well, I'm just saying, there's data there, there's input there. It may not be everything we want, but there's something, surely, that we can identify as, this is better than what we have, and it's at least a step in the right direction, that we're still actively trying to get better. But to just say... I just feel like it's a ways off any change if we totally scrap this. And if that's what it is, at the end of the day, you guys have to...

So, again, you're using language of scrap. We're not talking about using language of scrap. We're talking about language of enhance.

And they are... REA is willing to... Enhance.

Well, but enhance, but so this is one, Van Buren Township is one six-month process. And even if we get that done, that doesn't get us to a comprehensive plan. There's still three more townships. Even if we did those in sequence in six more months, which probably wouldn't be the timeline, but let's say it was, that's a year. Then there's time to rewrite and incorporate and go through. So that's what I'm saying. Two years realistically to get from this point to all four townships done individually to the plan rewritten and accepted.

i wouldn't go two years but but we we do have some a solution that could be done now that is a good start just not complete so is there a way for you guys to pass this with or pick the parts you like or yeah or say hey we're going to update this and as part of that update this is going to be revisited every three years, or every whatever, because honestly, by the time we get, I agree with Kara, why push it off another two years? Why waste the money

Because even, like, realistically, what's in it, like, the zoning map is the most disruptive, would be the most potentially disruptive change. Even if we said we don't have enough information to understand where people would want development or where we want X, Y, Z, we're not, we're sticking with the zoning categories there are. That part's not changing, but we're clarifying some of these other categories. intentions but you just hit the nail on the head of what is the most controversial and troublesome for this county is the zoning right that's so bad but the complaint doesn't determine zoning it does i mean like that would normally be part of it that you'd be adopting well i'd like influences yes i'd like to hear kevin amplify on that just a little bit more

So if you're going down, again, like I shared the last time around, we're a county that is, again, the demographics, elderly, right? It's a retirement community. It is a bedroom community. It's tourism. And the part that suffers from that, like I said, I'll go back to the decision that the commissioners made with regards to Clark Electric. I have... hundreds of small businesses in this county that have no means by which to operate legally under our ordinances.

He is a totally different. He's a bird of a different feather because it's not his home. He's got so many employees.

I understand, but if I look at the various kinds of things that are businesses in this community, and I'm going to turn and look at Kenny and say, I'm a family business, but I know he's got employees that are coming to his facility. Maybe one of them lived there, but ain't all of them living there. But again, if that were the case, but there are businesses like that, right?

No, because those are the ones that we see. The guy mowing up on, what was the name?

Laundry, something.

That, where the guy drowned his wife. Not the petitioner, but the... Don't get that reference. Anyway, live down that road.

Green Acres.

Green Acres. We had a situation where the neighbors said, hey, you got 10 extra vehicles coming up, flying up and down this road every day. I see them throwing trash. I see them, you know what I mean? So that's how we find out about it. This particular case with the commercial building, I know at least 100 people that would have bought that building if it was done commercially. Heartbeat.

It would have never been available.

It would have never been available. I've had so many people call me about it.

That's how much demand there is.

I know the guy that owned it. He tried to sell it to me. I'm like, Matt, what am I going to do with it? You can't do anything with it. That's a whole other argument as well. I'm the biggest proponent for small business and protecting the people that live and work here. That sucked. I wish there was a way that we could have figured out, and we've talked about maybe identifying some allowances or special exceptions. after we get the comp plan in action and start working on our ordinance.

But I guess the question is, to your point, how does this proposed way forward solve that problem?

So it gets us to the point to where you've got feedback from the community that comes back and says, here's what we would like to see.

That is the biggest. But the thing that was, like, it's the zoning that doesn't allow it. So that's, again, the comprehensive plan is one thing. It says we want to see this sort of thing in these sort of places. But then the zoning ordinance still doesn't allow for it. Can I say one thing? I've got another meeting.

We can step up to that microphone or yell.

He probably wants to yell. I'll pay him again.

Kenny Wagler. There was a few things that I just jotted down. You guys have a lot of big tasks.

I say on the plan itself, 150 pages, is that right? If you could take the data and some of the statistics and put them over here where you can find them and just put some of the key points. I think if you go to the public and say you've got a 150-page master plan coming off of a 15-page or 19-page.

Nine or 12. Their eyes are going to cross.

The key points of change, maybe you could outline this.

On the dollar-wise, since the other three townships are more challenging, make sure that it is $29.95 for everyone.

Right. Thank you, guys. Thank you.

Thanks for coming.

So, again, so the contract aspect of it and talking about the pricing and all those kinds of things, that's all something that is becoming much more rigorous where we're at right now than we were. Okay? So, I mean, like I said, we... I don't think we've had. So that aspect of what you're asking for, I'm not concerned with. I believe that will be addressed. I believe it will clearly have. Again, because, again, and I'm not trying to – because my world experience has been in project management, so I know what it takes from A to move it from A to B, right? And so we've got knowledge there that will facilitate, hopefully, a quick return and the expectations. My concern, again, so going down that path, you're saying, well, can we go interim? I'm not comfortable saying, well, it doesn't really bring light to where we have deficiencies. I don't know, a bright enough light to move us past when it comes to another decision before the Board of Commissioners and the Area Planning Commission say it's definitive, yes, this is where a comp plan sets us.

Well, the information in here and the solicitation like drawn out and talked about and it wasn't just this wasn't a list of things that that company gave us like this is also stuff that from talking to the community from talking to the you know what I mean like there was a lot of work I worked the polls for this I've worked I mean we've got hours and hours in it so it's not I understand needing more hundreds I'm in I agree It's not like we did zero. Yeah, it kind of makes me feel like everything about this is unacceptable. If none of it is acceptable, is all of it. I guess, is there any way we can update our comp plan? and institute a this process while do it like i thought you wanted us to vote you said amendment i'm that's the that's the ic code language i'm the commissioner's proposal this was a proposed amendment and no we vote yes on this plan no no okay so yes i'm i love this i love it i just do we i hear you do we wait another

And to that point, we could be in conjunction with this happening if we had enough, you know, something as would be one of the comp plan to start addressing some of these other zoning pieces, the ordinance pieces that we know are lacking, like the situation with, you know, whether or not that particular property, there's definitely a gap for like service type businesses and where those would be appropriate or So there's all this other stuff that we're kind of like, well, if the comprehensive plan's about, you know what I mean? We want to make those changes in line with it. And it just is frustrating to have to look at people and...

Frustrating was spending a year and a half on definitions.

That was.

Definitions. That was. But it's done now.

And it's helping now.

And now it's helping. We've put a bunch on this, and I believe it's incomplete, but I think it's way more comprehensive than what we have. unless there's something particularly in this that you are opposed to that we could change. If there's something in it that's gotten somebody's crawl that they don't like, Yeah, let's talk about it. But the whole thing? Like, you can't say the whole thing.

I don't think that's it, Andy, myself. I think if I'm hearing you guys correctly, your main concern was just you'd like to see more public input. Correct. Is that a fair statement? That's it. Okay. And you reached out to a company that you're familiar with, who you've seen work before, RIA. And you ask them and talk to them if they could put together a template of some kind or an approach to that. How can we go about it? How can we do this? And what we're looking at right now is that is the end result of that. Is that a fair statement? Okay. We're not bound to it. They're not bound to it. You're not bound to it. So what you're asking is we'll be interested in going through this kind of a process and coming up then with an amendment.

If necessary.

To, if necessary, to our existing, to this one right here. Were those all fair statements? Okay.

For me, I... Yeah, you're going to have four sub-area plans in addition to this. This will be amended. You're going to have four sub-area plans. Right. And when you go through those plans, do you find or discover something that you might want to tweak in the main plan? So that would be... That would be kind of after the process or maybe in term. Yep, we didn't think about that. Here's the impact here. Let's tweak this in our current plan. So you could almost, if you need to, don't know, because we're not getting the input. But if you did get the input, we could do that kind of all at the same time.

I love that, because it can continue. And when we get done with Van Buren, in three or four more years, we could do it again. We could just keep it rolling. Right. Ultimately, it would be great to open up a conduit for the community to be able to tell us what they want on a consistent basis.

Well, and they kind of do that when they come for zoning changes and special exceptions.

Sure, sure. But that only applies to that particular thing, not the whole community. Right. My question is, how does this get us to updating the ordinances?

It does.

Not any time soon. Yeah. So. That's going to

But it would be something that if we, and I correct me if I'm wrong, if we accepted and updated the new comp plan with the caveat or the exception that the commissioners say, hey, we appreciate the work you did. It's not quite there. So to ensure that it's going to get there, we're issuing a directive for more, right? So now this company can start taking the lead on organizing those community events and we can start as a board working on because we'll have an updated comp plan now we can start working on actual ordinances and going through those this board can focus on the ordinances well I mean this is this will still need some attention but most of the work is going to be done by the third party holding the events I have a question is Veritas gonna have a fit that we're gonna just rip their

plan apart it's our plan it's not copyrighted or anything no we own it do we possess the editable copy of this what do we have a pdf copy or an editable pdf copy what was your question do we have an editable copy what's the harm in this to satisfy the entire table sitting here why don't we put a schedule in here

with everything you guys are wanting, we can agree to the schedule, phase one, phase two, phase three, phase four. No public input, township, township, township, township. I think we want the same thing. Put it in here, mod it, and pass it for now, and work towards phase one, work towards phase two. I think we're all in agreement. And at the same time, ordinances.

The way they're proposing it is that's not what would happen, that this would be shelved until the other sub-area plans are done. But. I know you're saying, we don't have to worry about the contracts. We'll figure out the money. But just that, we couldn't even put out a bid probably till next month. We couldn't even agree that we're going to do that till next month. And then it'd be another month till we do that. You're saying it doesn't have to take two years. I don't see how it doesn't. Because we don't have the money to do it right now. So yeah, budgets are coming up. We've got to include that. This is a realistic expectation. And I think to Andy's point, can we find a way to pass something so that it's not just all bound up? Because if a public input, you know, you guys didn't have a public session or whatever is required for the actual comprehensive plan, like the public hasn't had a chance to say on record, don't pass this, we don't like this part. I don't even know what all the steps are.

A great way to get public input would be to read it at the commissioner's meeting and let the public comment on it. As a, and again, I'm not.

And it can be with the understanding of we are working to incorporate more here, but we're trying to get a V1 that can work for folks so we're not just held up.

If there's anything in it that's going to tick people off, they'll tell, they would have, I mean, we've read it and proposed it here. I don't think there's a big, like, room filler.

We took out the mowing standards.

Well, bear in mind again. Oh, gosh. The comprehensive plan is not an enforceable document. It is not an ordinance. It is not a law. It is not a statute. But it does guide our commission. Just a second, Andy, please. It's just a guidance document that we use is what it's for. The ordinance itself that will be predicated upon the development of this document here will be the enforcement document. So it's merely, I don't want to use the word merely, but it is just a guidance tool for the Planning Commission and for the community and for the commissioners. It's not enforceable. We can't take someone to court or fine someone because they're doing something in violation of the comprehensive plan.

But it's not about that. Like, as an example, let me know if I have this understanding right. For example, the Clark electrical request where he's saying, I would like this to be rezoned general business. typically you would expect the comprehensive plan to identify areas or characteristics that would allow, would be like positive for something to be rezone general business.

Yes.

And if it said the greasy creek corridor along 135 and you know, whatever, those are areas we've identified for development. That that would have swayed us as well. Yeah, we have said this is an area appropriate for business development. Our current one doesn't do that. This one, I don't know that it says Greasy Creek, but like that's the point. So it's not enforceable, but we are supposed to go back to what the comprehensive plan says.

Yeah, that's true. It's supposed to be a directional document. Now, we all know we don't use it.

Well, we do, but we can't because there's nothing there.

We do use it.

So my point is, we do use it, but it's useless. Like, we are referencing it, but it's so generic and vague as to be useless.

You know, we talked about that. And we could argue on the quality of that first plan. I don't think that's bad. I think you can make changes to that to improve it. And one of those would be decision criteria. Identify that four criteria, break it out, and identify those definitions so when you're approving something, you would know. And there's enough in there, general guidance, that you could expand into different sections and do that.

I mean, I could probably take screenshots of 50 posts in the past where you've said the current comprehensive plan is terrible and we need a new one.

I don't think I used terrible. I said it's vague. And when I briefed you on when we went through the Tilton debate, did I not identify improvements? I identified decision criteria by several pages of that. Here's what you could do to define what these things are. This is how the current plan could be improved.

Yeah. I don't have any problem. I just think we want a plan that's better to move forward with so that we can deal with all the other things.

Well, we got that now.

But they're not going to accept this.

Well, I know.

And so that we can move on to updating, deleting, and creating ordinances because that's how you work. Okay? This is a nice tool, but that's the tool that gets us to the next tool, which is ordinances.

You know, I've told my children. I've... As you're trying to, and bear with me for just a second, as you're figuring out what you want to be when you grow up, you still have to have a vehicle to take you there. So you can dream all you want while you're working, right? Like, plan for that up here, but in the meantime, you got to have something that's going to get you, you know, keep you going, keeping, feeding the bulldog, making money. I feel like this is kind of the same. This is not a Cadillac. This is a Corolla. It's a Corolla. It's a camera. It meets the minimum requirements according to the state. Should we jump in the new Corolla or keep walking until we get a new Corolla? I guess that's how I'm looking at it. As the taxpayers, if we decide not to take this car that we've already paid for, who's responsible for that? Did I fail and waste $40,000? Because that's what will happen, essentially, right?

If there's a clear set of updates to the current comprehensive plan that you guys feel like fit the bill, I think we would, besides your point of cost and time.

Let me interject. But the clear amendments... are contingent upon getting the feedback that we're asking for.

Well, no, Tim just said he has an idea of updates to the current plan. That would at least get us somewhere.

But that's not public input. Who said that? That's not public input. Our concern was we didn't have the community engagement to put together this plan. It wasn't there. That was our biggest concern.

Well, I think that can be argued at an item, Tim.

That's their stance. This is a fact. That's their stance. Yeah, right. They have to accept.

Yeah, and I'm saying that there's probably some validity to that. I mean, we would have liked to have seen a lot more people come in to the meetings and to share their ideas and information. They just didn't.

It wasn't for the lack of trying. No.

So possibly this process here may do that. Now, I've read this and one of my concerns is I think it's a little parochial and what we're looking for is a comprehensive plan. And parochial and comprehensive, those two things just don't comport very well. So you're going to be looking at the unique needs of each township and information from those, but you're going to have to meld all that together to come up with a general comprehensive plan. Yes, I agree. It's going to be difficult to do to synthesize that down out of that kind of a matrix. I don't think so. I disagree with you.

I've done these for countries. This is a county.

We like to think ourselves a country, Kim. Country, Brant County. Brant County.

Country, USA. So what the commissioner is asking tonight is for the ABC to vote yes or no, go forward with this. But I don't think they can do that until they, you know, we're not signing a blank check because.

have a chapter right the only thing that I am looking that I think that has to come from this is you have you taken you've taken the time to look through this do you believe that this is an acceptable approach in order for us to go and address our needs and what we consider to say the public coming in And, again, I'm going to be the negative nelly on the side of saying, well, we may take this approach and we may not have any more input than we had. And then the decision point comes back saying, well, we've got no further input from where we had, so, therefore, it goes back to the question of this receipt. So within a three-month or whatever period – Here it is. You can come back here, and next thing you know, you go forward with this, and next thing you know, your ordinance is. Good luck with the ordinances, because this place, it's, and that's why we have the chaos.

Can I be the first one to answer your question?

Yeah.

Yes. I think this process probably will gather more public input. Okay. Now, whether it actually does or not, I don't know. But I think the process itself is probably going to, just for no other reason, because of the availability.

And I'm not opposed to Kyle's response of, if this is a proof of concept, it works, we can find the funding, work out what those dollars need to be, then we can go down the path of saying, well, the first one's been done, subsequent will be, and that could potentially be an agenda and schedule that gets put in front of this. Is that a clear enough way forward?

If that's what you guys are saying you want, then...

I love it. I'm all about more. And I told the last company we hired, for what they were charging for an event, we can do way better. Like, we can get some barbecue and some local volunteers to really have... We could also put something, I said we could put something inflammatory, like we're going to, we've got a data center coming. If you want responses, we can create responses, right? I mean, we can get people ticked off to get them in here.

Compared to what we had and what we're dealing with now and compared with this one, we thought it was a pretty good job. So there might be a little bit of animosity, and I don't want to use that, not with a capital A, that this is kind of being brought back to us that this isn't good enough.

And we know, we know we want more community engagement. We knew that before we started. Absolutely. All right.

Okay. The REA, I think I made the comment the REA plan read like a good book. I liked what I saw on the town of Nashville's plan. I really did. It pissed me off, for lack of better words, on this company's plans when they would refuse to modify the captions that were incorrectly captioned on the pictures. So they were challenging, to say the least. Which doesn't even... But we have... into this. If we could find a way to work together, mod this, we get V1 out there with a schedule.

Right, but that doesn't sound like that's an option.

Is it not an option? What's V1? Get something with, blend a little bit of an approach in here with a schedule.

Let's let the public read it.

I'm fine with that.

I don't know how you can do that piecemeal.

I mean, you would have one, and you would be saying that we are actively working to gather this information, and we're incorporating it as we go.

Can we not update the comp plan every four months? Yeah, exactly.

We have the money? I mean, there's a process.

We can update this thing every week to get the money.

Right, there's a process of public input, yeah, but I don't think there's any.

I don't think it's that simple to just make that statement.

Tim said all they had to do to update the current comprehensive plan is raise their hand. We'd like to update. You told me one time we can update what we have to qualify for OCA. You lost me. 2011 company.

They have to do some series of public input, I believe. You have to have at least a public meeting or two. Yeah, go ahead. At your official commissioner's meeting, do you have to get public input? I don't know the ins and outs of the process.

You have to talk to the attorneys on the interpretation. You're saying can we take the 2011 and change the date and call it current?

I thought you told me we could.

Yeah, I'm curious. Why couldn't we?

I would have done that 40 grand ago. Why would we want to? We wouldn't. So we spent 40 grand on a new one, knowing that we needed 80 to get a tight one. So let me read. Let's take this back in history with an R, because I feel like I'm going insane. When we interviewed companies. Responses from three. One was literally asleep on the computer when we live-zoomed them. They didn't know we were in Indiana. Like, clues. The next two companies gave their presentation. One said, hey, you don't have enough to do the whole thing. Why don't we start with the input? Why don't we start engaging the community? Knowing that next year, I know some funding that might be available that we can, and that was Kevin. won't be read attaching and then there's two slightly different approaches but the biggest difference in those companies one was intimately involved and a citizen of Brown County the other had zero knowledge of Brown County other than driving through it

They have properties here.

We said that at the meeting, though. What one has going for them is that they know the community. What the other one has going for them is that they don't know the community. And we picked the one that didn't know the community. We've had meetings and meetings over knowing that we weren't going to have, because when Veritas to in different places, but they did them at the same time. So yes, 100% agree with you, but because that component isn't there, is all the work, does it make more sense to go ahead and pass so we have one updated with the directive to continue fielding so that we can get started on the ordinances?

Or try to gather input on what we have now, We don't have the input of the public hearings because we have one person show up to our APC meeting.

Yeah.

Literally one person.

From the public hearing meeting? Yeah.

People don't care.

Unless it's their neighbor that they're unhappy with, as usual.

And that comes down to an ordinance most of the time.

And I'm going to be the guess from even more animosity. If they don't care, then why do we have a comprehensive amendment other than being required by state law to have it? It's for us. They don't care until they do.

Until they have an animosity or something. That's the only time they should have public meetings, usually. By and much.

Unfortunately. So, again, I feel like I'm chasing my tail here. This is what we're asking. It sounds like people are sitting there saying, yes, this could be a good approach to this. Again, the recommendation I put before myself here is saying let's engage, let's find out what the dollars and cents are on this to see if this works. approach would work and then if it ends up going down that path where it's work and we can obligate ourselves and commit to Following it from there from from going forward to next. I'm not saying that that's not You're not starting with that You know, I don't I don't believe that we are going to start with blank pager No, you think rea is going to use fairness as document.

My expectation would be that they will I So if they're going to be using the document anyway, can we roll it out to the public to get some input?

It's been on the website since the 15th of July of last year.

Yeah, it's been there. It's out there.

I mean, and to all of our – like, I would so much rather put this money in input to the ordinance piece because that is the – What we need to do. What's it? I don't know. But like part that fires people up that has that is enforceable, that has a direct impact on their ability to do what they want with their land and with their livelihoods. And like that's where we see the most. But like the comprehensive plan is the first piece to it is required. We are supposed to look at those criteria when we're making choices. But if we're saying it, then OK, fine. Then let's just stick with what we have. But I don't know. I'm just like, what is the path forward to actually solving the problem, which we all know at the end of the day is the ordinance itself?

Right. Because if we just keep spinning on this section of the process, and we keep spinning on here, we're not going to get here. And that causes problems for us when people come to petitions, and it causes problems for the zoning appeal when people come, because we do not have updated ordinances in any way, shape, or form.

I mean, at the end of the day, if you all say this is the step, this is what we have to do, that's what we'll do, and we'll do it, but then we're accepting just whatever that timeline.

Yeah, it's ultimately your ordinance. All over the bar.

Right. So I guess that's what, like.

Yeah. So you can go down that path, sorry, down the path. So let me just, the question is, you have a 2011 comprehensive plan. You could be writing ordinances today. If he's going through the repeat of the comment is so vague, you could drive a truck through it. Nothing says that.

You're talking about based on the 2011 plan.

Correct. Right. We understand that. Believe me. So we go back to the point of, is it really, is this really holding that process up?

Yes. If that's what you want us to, if that's what you want the Perzoni Ordinance, yes. If that's what you want us to base the ordinance off of, then I guess we just start pulling things out of a hat.

I'm not saying that, but I'm just sitting there saying it. We all sit in here and have the perspective of that. You've asked us what the need is. We've identified this and saying, can this go forward? It's a step-by-step process. I can't even, again, there are things. Again, it's a money thing, but you have the commissioner sitting here saying, we will go and have these follows up with the council to see where we can bring these things forth.

allocated to pay for this sure we put in the budget okay and i'm just asking again please i'm on your guys's team i just i'm trying to get clear direction if you go to the council and say hey we need forty thousand dollars for our comprehensive plan someone there is going to say Didn't we give you $40,000 for your comprehensive plan?

They gave you $10,000.

Where did the other come from? Foundation. I don't know the differences between the two. $10,000.

Which they didn't even have to give us. I already had that written into the budget.

$10,000 for council, $30,000 from community foundation.

$27,750 from community foundation as a gift.

And I'm just, again, I say...

and Okra had 60,000, we would have qualified.

But we knew it was the first RFP that we weren't going to qualify.

Yeah, and I think that's what...

I mean, we were told that immediately.

Kevin Allen was like, you won't do that, but there's this and this. And I think he was going on the... Again, he was going on the, hey, I'll do the little bit that you got because I know I can get the funding to finish it. Like, he was confident that he could secure the funding. That's the way he made it sound. Yeah, man.

I didn't share his confidence in that.

No, because Okra is not going to give us money, period. We're not getting a planning grant unless a lot of things change in the county LMI-wise.

Which we don't want. We don't want to qualify for OCRA, right?

Well, what's funny, we're at 40.4. I managed the income survey to get the planning grant from OCRA back in 2017. They allowed us to do a statistical sample because they didn't have the census data that came within the measurement of error. So we did a random sample based on federal government standards, and we came in at 53.1% in 2017. change to today huge change you know and that was a certified random sample you know had to be blessed by the feds and blah blah blah so I wonder

approve the plan that we've put the work in, knowing that there's more work to do, and trusting us to do the work. So what happens, let me stop that, I just had a different rabbit hole. What if we get a number back from these people and there's no money? Do we wait another year, another fiscal year, to look at money again and just let it sit? Or can we start on the, like, can we go ahead and get this Corolla for now and have directives and hold us accountable? As a board, I need to see some progress. I need to see some movement. I don't know that we need an outside company to organize community events.

I think we do.

Oh, that's a big, that is a, that's a big, that's a big.

Like, yeah, we can throw a shindig. Yeah, we can get a bunch of people to come and tell us what they think, but are we going to be able to capture the data statistically and analyze that? I can't do that.

That's a big black hole that will suck the life out of you.

Yeah.

So, and there's certain steps that you have to follow with that as well. Let me just ask you, gentlemen, what is it you want from us? What would you like to see from the commission?

If the proof of concept is acceptable and you believe it's a workable approach, then let us go through and pull actual dollars. That's correct. Pull numbers together to see what the cost would be in order to roll this particular thing out. Consider if we need to go through the exercise of getting a second source. validate funding for this approach, and then come back and share that information and go from there. Is that acceptable?

Madam Chairman, do we need a motion for that? Carol? Are you collating?

No, she's cogitating.

So, Tim, in any of your discussion with them, they didn't allude to a price, a number at all? No. I don't even know that we asked. Do we know what they were billing previously for Nashville, like man hours and stuff? Do we have any breakdown of that?

We can go in and get all that data from that town in Nashville.

I think Sam said it was $80,000.

That was for a full meal deal, nine months, I think. It went at least nine months on that.

Yeah.

They had their online, well, they identified different options. They had their online stuff.

But this is six months for one, for a fort. Like they say in the document, it's three months prep, three months engage for one township. And then the others can be done accordingly. So, what I'm trying to...

The three months is the up front with the so-called steering group, just to set the stage and get confirmation of the way to go forward. Billable hours. That's the first three months, correct? Billable hours. That's what I was looking at. The time spent for each township was estimated at three months.

36912. Nashville's program was a year. If we compare man hours to man hours, billable hours to billable hours, it might be less, it might be 60. If we had 60 to start with, we wouldn't be here.

But we're not starting from scratch either. We've already got a starting document, and that's part of their review to look at the draft plan, look at the old plan, look at zone new ordinance and maps and the GIS stuff. So they identified their data source. That's part of that first three months thing. So a lot of the data, I don't think they're collecting any more data, I wouldn't think. I mean, I don't think they're going to repeat anything you've already got in here. We're looking. to get the input from the townships. So the scope is much smaller.

So I understand what you're saying. I'm hearing what you're saying. Say we go through the process. What do we end up with? We still don't have ordinances updated. Is that correct?

I'm just concerned about spinning wheels here and spinning wheels here and we are not moving into the next section which impacts the daily function

here in the county when people bring things in or to the meetings or to the zoning thing. So I'm trying to understand when does this end stop and we move on? Not that it never stops. It's always going to be updated and changed. But when does that stop and we move on to the next section? We're back to baby steps. We've got to do one. We've got to get this done, move on to that. I mean, I understand that. It just seems like we're spinning here and we're not getting forward.

Well, we heard what Kevin was asking of us, and we don't have our legal counsel here today to give us any kind of guidance, so I'm going to look to you, Kayla, for some advice here. Is this a... Just go through, make the motion, contingent upon review by day filling. I'm not even sure it takes a motion. I don't know what we're... Is this just some kind of a... They came, they informed, and we've listened, and it can be done through just a... AN ACQUIESCENCE TYPE THING OR CONSENSUS?

YEAH, I THINK IT SHOULD BE A MOTION.

YOU THINK IT SHOULD BE A MOTION? WELL, THERE'S NO NEXT STEPS FOR US THOUGH.

NO, WE'RE WAITING ON THEM FOR WHAT THEY COLLECT FROM REA.

But we're not, we don't want to put it out for RFP or we don't know. You're not there yet.

No, we're not. And I don't see that this is going to put any, from a workload standpoint, during this transition or doing what they're wanting to do. How do you think it's going to affect you?

I mean, we're going from looking at starting ordinances soon to not starting, so it's positive effects on us.

Well, I mean, no, I meant you personally as for workload. Yeah. It looks like to me that Rhea is going to be doing most of the work with this.

Am I correct in that, Tim? I mean, they're a good company to work with.

That wasn't very convincing. What do you mean? When you did that. That was Kayla's conviction. Well, yeah, it's a deliverable. They identified specifically what they were going to deliver. Okay.

I just don't want us to say, yes, go ahead, sign a blank check, because I'm telling you, there's not a check to be written.

We don't need a motion for anything. You guys are the commissioners. If you want to cast REA to give you a number.

I would just like to hear a verbal consensus. I think I heard everybody say yes. Maybe not. I don't know.

I think we're all saying yes.

But please, just pass this one so we can move forward on it. That's all we were saying.

Take and choose, or tell us what you're willing to do.

And I don't envy your, like I told you before, like, your response, like, if you pass this, you're the one that's held accountable to the taxpayers in the next election. If there's something wrong with it, you'll pay the, I won't. Like, you know what I mean? I get it. I understand. But I want you to understand that we did, like, there's a lot of good data in here.

Yeah, this is our baby. I mean, the comp plan is the plan commission's baby. They adopted the baby, but we're the birth parents.

They didn't adopt the baby.

I know. The baby's still at the fire station right now.

Let's be honest.

I'm okay giving the baby away. I don't know that that's a good analogy, but okay.

I guess I don't understand why we can't take this Corolla that we've already paid for, get in the thing while we drive to the ATM to go buy a better car.

opportunity to improve the answer to that is the commissioners aren't going to accept this without this or something similar to this can we make a motion to push this forward while we do that we've already done that yeah that's not going anywhere that's on the committee yeah that's on them they've already said no they're not doing that it's the ultimate saying we'd like to basically get your feedback on a look at this is tenable i appreciate

everything. I really do.

It's a conversation. I mean, we could have just said, no, you'll never see it again. Yes. Right.

What would have been better is if you came with, Hey, we'd like you to do this. And by the way, Door number two, it's all paid for. And there'll be a big reveal.

I found the money, and here you go. That's a council. That's a council.

It's a boy.

It's a boy. It's a boy.

Okay.

So, okay. I've got what I think we can move forward with.

Well, I guess I'm just looking for all we wanted was support moving forward for the For the concept.

We just feel like, and then what from us?

And then we'll go forward, find the money, find the process, whatever we've got to do, work out the details. But we just want your support.

I guess I would say you have my 100% support as long as this is still run. through the people on this board, and we don't feel like it's just been taken from us. That's not the intent. Right, but you understand how that might.

Statutorily, it has to be. Yeah, it can't be taken.

Right. Again, we wouldn't have had two joint sessions if that's what the intent was. Right.

Yeah, I don't, exactly.

I agree with you 100%, and this, from what I've read of it, seems like a very... input, I hope.

If you guys have any way that you see a version one that can get passed in the interim, because I do think realistically we're a year away from any, just because of the timeline for money, we're a year away from anything at a minimum with the sub-area plan. So it's like if there's any improved comprehensive plan that you would be open to, I would love to know what it is. Not right now. I mean, I think that's like a back to the drawing board thing. But whether it's the current one, just with some different criteria added to them, or whatever, something that lets us be moving in tandem.

With a schedule right here.

care of the same the same we're gonna have the same issue yeah I could and I did I could go through all my notes and different points I had on that one but so what I mean we can talk about the changes the amendments to the existing plan but again it's still absence of community input so whatever the data stuff you could do without without a big impact that our thing was getting the community input so I don't

Again, we all agree that more input and quality input would be better. And again, I guess that's maybe what you're telling me. That's it? That's the only thing that's acceptable? But both of you are involved in the community. You hear things. You've been involved in many data collection and community input. It's not like we have no input in no context of what, in general, people say they want. And again, if it has to be... somewhat vaguer its decision. I don't know. And maybe it just, well, this is just what it is. That seems like maybe what you're saying, but I think that's our frustration. Is there not anything we can move forward with as a better baseline?

Does anybody on the board have a motion?

I say we just throw it all, cost to the wind, Rochambeau for it right now.

Okay, anybody have a serious motion?

I mean, what's the motion that we're going to wait to hear back from the commissioners? No.

There's no person making a motion on it.

There's nothing to make a motion. I think as a board, we can all say, yeah.

We make a motion to support this. We are saying we're all game.

But it's not. There's nothing definitive to make a motion.

To allow them to continue down this path to make... What did we call them? Amend and enhance the draft.

They can do that.

We've already passed it to them and they have not officially rejected it.

They need your guys' blessing to continue working on this part.

Please do. We want an updated comprehensive plan.

The difference is you guys are asking for a price versus us asking for a price, right?

The difference is that we want to continue down this path to gather the additional information to see what the next steps are to move this forward so that there's an actual dollar figure and then have a clear timeline and those kinds of things going forward.

Okay. That's my motion right there. Sorry. Maybe Randy has a better motion.

No, probably not. Would you repeat your motion, please?

He's got to repeat my motion.

Would you repeat her motion, please? So my comment is, is that the board showing support for the approach in this prototype, excuse me, this prototype, to gather additional feedback with this to amend or enhance the existing... Comprehensive plan.

Can we say existing? Or should we say draft? Sorry. Strike existing.

There are two different drafts. Comprehensive plan. 2025 draft.

I guess as a board, we could say no. Good luck. Let's not go there.

Okay. There's a motion. I'll second it. She's made a motion.

There's a second.

I'll second it. Okay. Any further discussion?

No.

Lord, I hope not.

Roll call.

Sarah. Yes. Andy. Yep. Kyle. Yep. Carol. Yes. Tim. Yes. James.

Yes. Randy.

Yes.

Well, I don't know. Yes, yes, yes, yes.

Pull that chair out.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

The time for cogitation is finished.

Oh, Caleb got a multi-syllabic word.

I've got part two. Motion. Motion. Motion to adjourn. Commissioner's meeting. Commissioner's meeting. I second.

We are now done.

Commissioner's meeting. You guys got more. We're not done yet. You've got one more thing.

Hey, guys.

Thank you.

Thanks, guys.

How do you really feel, Andy?

How do you really feel?

When they asked me to do this thing, I told Chris, they're going to fire me. I'm going to say something that's going to get me uninvited to come back.

Okay, we're back live again. Back live. So are we discussing the decreased setback requirements at the lake?

Yes. So the board, Jane, whenever you want to step in, you just tell me to stop talking.

Okay.

She wants you to keep talking. She hasn't said stop talking yet.

So the board is noting appeals. We've been doing a lot of setback variances in the lake districts.

And we've got one on tomorrow night, too.

Yes. Yeah. And we actually went through and gathered a lot of information here. So we'll just say since 2020, and we'll just say how many variances that came to the Board of Zoning Appeals were in Lake Districts. So 5 of 11 in 2020, 3 of 9 in 2021, 22, four of nine. 23, six of 10. 24, five of 11. 25, seven of eight. And 26, we've had, every single one has been a lake until tomorrow night.

The lake districts are just Cordray, Sweetwater, and Lake Lemon?

So there are, it's the Somerset Lake, Greenbrier, Lake Lemon, Most of Axum Ranch Road down by Lake Monroe. Parts of TC Steel and Crooked Creek. So basically surrounding the big lakes. And then there are the other small ones. So Greenbrier off Kramer Road. Lake LaSalle? I believe Lake LaSalle is LR.

So what we're facing is they want to build a house too big for the lots. And we're approving them, just rubber stamping them. And all of a sudden, we're like, you've got restrictions here. And you're building such a large house. That is the runoff going to be too much? I mean, are you going to flood your neighbors out? All kinds of issues that are coming, questions that are coming up. We're just rubber stamping.

So that starts to be like, well, you told 10 other people.

Yes, and that's where the first person that gets turned down is going to have a fit. But we have to stop. We've got to draw the line somewhere because the house is, I mean, useful.

What's the current setback? 25 feet from the rear. And now what is the platted setbacks out there? Like 5 foot, 6 foot, isn't it?

We go by the county zoning ordinance. So if it's not a PUD, then I don't care what they say about it.

But when the lakes were created, they had setbacks and those were platted on there. And those affect the size of the lots when they're created. And the fact that we've increased the setbacks... beyond what was originally on the Platts. I don't think that's really, I don't know, I find that a hard one to buy. If you buy a lot and you have X setbacks and you triple those setbacks.

Well, now it's 50-2. Reducing the setbacks.

No, they've increased them. They used to be like, I think they were six foot on some of the old Platts and everything. I've watched some of the new Platts.

Some of them, too, I've read. just in the Democrat or whatever, that it's like, well, we had something there, there was a garage, and it met the old setbacks, but now we're wanting to come back and do a new setback, like to your point, that the new setback is further than what was previously.

You're talking about additions as well to existing homes, right, Jane? Not just new construction.

Well, that too. Well, that's what I meant.

We're talking about... New construction and additions.

Additions, mainly additions, but new construction. We had one that the house was torn down or burned down or something, and that's a new construction.

There's several ones that aren't buildable out there. If you hold the setbacks, there's not a building spot. No, there's not. It's like a 15-foot strip to the property left.

It wasn't designed for the size houses that people want to build in.

Well, not only that, but you've got septics.

I don't know. Wait, you guys are doing two different things? No, I'm talking about the existing setbacks on the plats.

You're saying they're restrictive. She's saying she wants to be on restrictive.

They used to be like five or six foot on each side. We're talking about the rear. Oh, the rear setback. The lake side. We're not doing side setbacks.

No. We can discuss that, too.

I mean, because the side setbacks are a huge one. I mean, because if we're doing 20... We have people combining lots they can build. And still they're getting a variance for the setbacks because they're so huge.

Regardless, I guess, of the size, Jane's point is this is what it says and we keep getting asked to. So it's either that's what it is and there's a reason why it's that and that's what we're sticking with or there's a reason why it shouldn't be that and then we should be changing the ordinance. That's what we're saying.

How about we traditionally left it to the Lake District to They do not care.

They don't claim to have any jurisdiction over it.

So they get a building permit from us, take it to Nick Johan at Sweetwater, and they say, sure, show up for a meeting, here's your date and your time, we'll talk about it then. Because they've got, oh my gosh, what are those? Covenants and restrictions. I could not think of the words.

So they're more worried about grass height than garbage containers and stuff like that than setbacks. Yeah.

In a lot of cases, the builders are coming in.

Yeah.

Not the owner. Because you wouldn't issue... And knows the language and all that to argue it.

You wouldn't issue the building permit if it wasn't... If it didn't need setbacks.

Well, typically, if you're getting so many zoning... requests for variations in those things or uh like we've been saying what's the word i'm looking for variances thank you then it is time to probably change your your ordinance or to get firm so they know don't even ask yeah i mean they can go either way right

uh you know you can make it less you can make it greater but there's obviously a need there for something to be changed or adjusted and that would require direct public input from sweetwater residents from any resident any i mean this would be an ordinance amendment yeah yeah but for the lake that only applies to the lake district right no well i mean yeah anybody can come people from the town of nashville can come but yes only in lr districts And this is just a talking point.

And this is like, to your point, to them, about how hard it's going to be to be comprehensive when you're just taking these little pieces. It's like LRs all over the place. And so maybe Sweetwater's okay with neighbors being six feet away from each other, but down on LaSalle or Kirk and Creek or whatever, they're like, no, that's not the point down here.

Which I think is why we've always kind of approve sweet water for the variances because there's been so many precedents well sweet water oh we're on we're being recorded aren't we yep

They have different We're all referencing is that where all the variance requests are coming from obviously this change would vary the vast majority But we would have to change it for the entire county, right?

You can't piece it out like that. So this is gonna be a change in the ordinance That's gonna have to go through all the public AAA requirements, et cetera, et cetera.

I mean, you could also, again, this is where the conference, you could say, well, we have an LR1 and an LR2. And an LR1, which is just around Sweetwater and Lake Lemon, in some scenario, that allows this. These other LRs, only LR2 allows this. Like you could go that route of breaking out your zones. But that's like an even bigger, that's where.

And I think we could do that. Realistically, we could do that. When we are just county. But being with the town two, like there's B1, B2, B3. So then we're going to have R1, R2, LR1, LR2, GB1, GB2, AB1, AB2. It's just so much to try to read through.

But, I mean, realistic, like, that's kind of our challenge now is the buckets are too big, and that's what makes it so we don't want to approve things because it's like that opens this big of a can of worms. We're okay opening this little tin of worms, but not the whole can. Not the bucket.

Could you differentiate L1 or L2? What's the other letter in there? LR. LR1 or LR2 by density or... How would you distinguish that? Because probably Lake Lemon and Sweetwater are the only two, like, there's people buying homes. High density. Well, and they're buying $500,000 homes and leveling them and putting up million and a half dollar homes. Yeah.

So this is something we can talk about at the next meeting, too. Just something that the VCA wanted brought up. And then I have another point. Once we're done with this, if you guys want to.

Don't we I mean why do we need to change the actual setback we need to

Enforce the setback. Deny the petition when it comes.

If it was originally platted and what was originally buildable, what made the lots buildable was smaller setbacks?

We were talking about different things.

But it still says, I don't know if his example is right, but it still says that for a residence it's 10 and 15 foot side setbacks. So if five was how they were platted and how the lots were planned, that's still a significant...

It is. Yeah, I don't... I don't know all that. I've never seen one of those.

One of the first ones we did, it was last February or something like that.

And maybe they weren't platted that way. Maybe it was like, well, this was built before there was a setback and...

Well, Jane brings up a good point. Are we going to enforce what we got or not? And if we do enforce what we have, then a lot of those variance requests that we get into BCA would be denied.

Yeah.

But we all kind of go, well, it's sweet water.

Right. Yeah, that's it. And we go, well, we did the last one.

We did the last three. We approved. Right.

And there's something you said about that from a liability standpoint.

Well, not really, though. Like, if you go to any other lake community, you go to Grandview or go to Harrison, houses are right on top of each other. Lake life's a little different. It just is. It is.

I agree. But should it be and do we want it to be?

Well, right.

What do they want it to be? As a community, they want that.

Right, and runoff and septic and all the other things.

And one of the neighbors, a recent one on a couple months ago, maybe didn't get their letter, didn't know about the meeting, that their neighbor was getting the ask for a setback, and they were not very happy.

When they're signing the front yard? No, they don't do that.

I wonder.

I wonder.

You just have to know your little lettering is published in the Democrat.

No signs.

No signs.

So I always go back to community. It's a violation of our sign ordinance.

No, they can't control the sign ordinance.

She didn't live here anyway. She wouldn't have seen the sign. Oh, okay. Speak.