If you have some ideas, put them in a post, please.

Malcolm

-- jumpoff joe (jumpoff@ecoweb.net), April 23, 2001

Answers

Here's another potential issue for us to consider.

Last Monday night, I presented the results of the Jumpoff Joe Citizens Advisory Committee meeting to the Rural Planning Commission.

The occassion was to let the RPC know where the Jumpoff Joe Creek residents stand on an application to rezone a forty acre lot which is currently zoned Woodlot Resource to RR-5. This new zoning would allow eight, five acre lots to be created for eight new residences.

The JJCAC's conclusions on this matter were that, under current land use laws, as written in the JoCo Rural Land Development Code, the application was in order, and should be approved.

However, we also voted unanimously to tell the RPC that we were not actually in favor of creating new higher density lots in the valley, but felt that we could not use this as a factor in voting pro or con the application. We also collectively asked the RPC to initiate a series of public meetings for the purpose on taking testimony from the citizens of JoCo, as a whole, regarding the direction we, as a county, want to see the county moving in the near term and long term future.

The specific language we voted on, in this regard (and this is from the official minutes of the meeting is as follows:

Ask for master plan of where the County is headed with regards to the quality of the building, method of construction, and housing density."

The RPC appeared to be interested in initiating such a process, although the Chairman, Richard Smith, did state that "their plates were full right now", but they would not forget about our request.

Smith also asked Michael Snider (director of the JoCo Planning Department, who was also present at the meeting) whether the JCCC might not be a more appropriate group to pursue these issues. No decision was made at that time, as far as who should be the lead group.

Any members of JCCC think we should be the ones to discuss this type of issue, as opposed to the RPC, or in addition to the RPC?

Where do you folks think we should be heading, as a county? Full Speed Ahead? "Smart Growth"? No growth? Other?

What do you think your neighbors, friends, families, etc. would like this area to be like ten or twenty, or fifty years from now?

Do you think we have the right, or the obligation, to look to the future, hold community meetings, gather information, and determine our own destiny in this regard? Or should we just accept the "fact" that growth is inevitable, and not worry about it?

Malcolm

-- Malcolm Drake (jumpoff@echoweb.net), May 03, 2001.

Folks, I don't know how this happened, but my reply of May 6 appears on this thread ABOVE Dave and Catherine's posts of May 5.

I'm going to attempt to move my post to put it in the proper order, though it will likely show today's date (May 11)

-- malcolm drake (jumpoff@echoweb.net), May 11, 2001.

Catherine, I agree with you wholeheartedly. I was a bit frustrated at the last JCCC meeting. Frustrated by how slow things seemed to move, but also frustrated that, in our attempt to avoid this, not spending enough time to adequately discuss each issue of importance.

I realize this must sound a bit paradoxical, and I guess it is. Nevertheless, I believe that it's true.

What we need to do, I believe, is each of us make a concerted effort to have our thoughts organized before speaking, keeping our orations as brief as possible, while still getting our points across, and NOT speaking on a topic if someone else has already adequately expressed what we were "about to say".

If we all do this, maybe we'll be able to get our infrastructure and procedures all worked out in a fairly timely fashion.

Regardless of how long it takes, it does seem very important not to rush through this necessary work too rapidly, so that we don't have to keep revisiting things later.

As far as whether to put "all ideas on all topics be put into one post" or " a separate post be created for each topic", I am open to suggestions.No one has ever accused me of being particularly organized... I'd like to hear what you think, though I suspect it's better to create separate posts for separate topics. I think it would make it much easier to review things later on, if we needed to find things in the archives.

I also think we should be postpone any requirement that members of other groups join JCCC until we are a lot more established, if we even want to do so at all.

Certainly, having the BCC formally invite the folks you mentioned is a fine idea; however, I've discussed the idea of mandatory membership in the past, and some folks (e.g. Richard Smith) expressed their concern that many folks would resent this requirement, since they already have very full plates. It IS a good topic for discussion, though!

Malcolm -- Malcolm Drake (jumpoff@echoweb.net), May 06, 2001. -- malcolm drake (jumpoff@echoweb.net), May 11, 2001.

-- malcolm drake (jumpoff@echoweb.net), May 12, 2001.

Response to What categories should we be discussing here?

Here are some potential categories:

- Land Use - Public health - Public safety - Improving County government

-- Dave Parrish (dparrish@rvi.net), April 23, 2001.

Malcolm,

You asked four questions in your post. I think that each of these questions is of sufficient importance and complexity that it warrants its own "thread", or a separate question, in this forum.

Anyhow, here's my answer to your question on the relationship between RPC and JCCC with respect to general land use issues:

I think the JCCC should be the lead organization AND that at least the Chairman (if not all of the members) of the RPC should be a member of the JCCC so that s/he can actively participate in the deliberations and at the same time provide technical guidance to the rest of us who are not land use experts.

Dave

-- Dave Parrish (dparrish@rvi.net), May 05, 2001.

Dave,

Malcolm has raised some excellent questions regarding land-use issues and growth. I think these should be among the first hot issues that the JCCC tackles. I agree with you, Dave, that the JCCC is the appropriate "lead agency" and that the RPC and UPC chairs and members should be members of the JCCC. Perhaps Jim Brock could extend a personal invitation urging them to join. Along that line, invitations should be extended to all members of all of the county's volunteer citizen committees. Their participation in the JCCC could be so critical and so valuable that perhaps the BCC may want to consider revising committee job descriptions to include participation on the JCCC.

On another note, I've read all of the workgroup reports to date. I'm really impressed with the time and energy that this handful of enthusiastic JCCC members is putting in. There are loads of good ideas and recommendations in the reports. These reports all need to be discussed in meaningful detail at our JCCC meetings, a task that cannot be accomplished by establishing an arbitrary 10 or 15 minute chunk of time for workgroup reports. This is especially true at this point in the JCCC's development. So much of what the workgroups are doing deals with procedural structures which must be in place before the JCCC can be an effective body. I would urge that more time be given at our meetings so that those things that need to be discussed and decided upon by the membership actually receive the time and attention they deserve. Once we get the structural stuff in place, and can move issues through a well-thought-out process, then we will be able to chew on issues and come up with timely and relevant reports to the BCC. But if we short-change the establishment of procedure now (as boring as it may be to some), our process will be glacially slow and confused on every issue we take on.

Dave (and Malcolm), when responding in this forum, should all ideas on all topics be put into one post? Or should a separate post be created for each topic?

Thanks for all the hard work.

Catherine

-- Catherine Wood (cwood@cdsnet.net), May 05, 2001.

I agree with everything Catherine said about spending the necessary time on each of the workgroup reports. My concerns are that: (a) dealing effectively with these reports may well take more than one whole meeting per report; and (b) meanwhile we won't be DOING anything. I am not the only one who has this concern. Many folks were champing at the bit to get to work on the issues (see www.jococc.org/issues.htm for the issues we've received already).

From where I sit, we are on the horns of a dilemma. I hope someone can figure out how to get us dehorned.

-- Dave Parrish (dparrish@rvi.net), May 13, 2001.