Sussex County Council will meet next week to consider land use reform recommendations finalized by a county commissioned working group last month.
The group finalized its recommendation package last month. It includes calls to update land use mapping, examine existing density, define “missing middle” housing types, and establish clear standards for rezoning.
Sussex County Council holds a workshop Tuesday to decide which recommendations it will take up and implement.
Some working group members have asked the county to commit to swift action, but County Administrator Todd Lawson says some recommendations may take longer than others.
“I believe there are some ‘low hanging fruit’ recommendations that could be implemented in a very short period of time. There are recommendations that are going to take months if not years to address when you couple together the comprehensive plan work that’s going to have to take place with those recommendations.” he said.
Lawson says that including some of the bigger recommendations into the county's comprehensive plan upgrade will be "necessary"; the information will also need to be included into the comprehensive plan's strategy map, which he says will take further additional time.
Working groups members like Delaware Center for the Inland Bays executive director Christophe Tulou argue it’s important for council to pursue the package in its entirety for the plan to be effective.
“If you’re going to create a situation that is workable for the conservationists amongst us, for the developers, for the low-income housing advocates, then you’re going to have to have some tradeoffs.” he told DPM. "What I would least like to see is this to be considered a 'menu' of options: 'Recommendations 1,5,7,9, and 12 are OK, and then the other ones we're just going to ignore.' I don't think we get to the type of wisdom that we're all aspiring to achieve [that way]."
The meeting will take this Tuesday October 14th, at 9:30 AM, in the Sussex County Public Safety Complex. It is open to the public.
