DavidE's blog

The Town of Kent Town Board is proposing to amend the zoning law for the Town by adopting something euphemistically called an Office Park Overlay District, or OPOD. You can see the text of the proposed law on the Town’s website, here. The proposal would permit and encourage R-80 residential land with access to state or county roads to be developed for commercial uses such as warehouses, distribution centers and manufacturing so long as the parcel involved meets certain conditions spelled out in the proposal and so long as the Town Board approves.

After studying it extensively, I’ve become convinced the proposal is an extremely bad idea that has the potential to seriously damage our town and our way of life. Yes, we need responsible commercial development, but this is not the way to go about encouraging it.

The Town Board will reconvene the public hearing on this matter on June 21 at 7PM at the town hall. After you understand what’s being proposed, I hope you’ll come to this hearing and speak out against this ill-considered proposal.

David Ehnebuske

Why the OPOD is a Truly Bad Idea

The OPOD propsal should not become law for three main reasons.

First: The process used to develop the OPOD proposal is not a good one

The Town has a Comprehensive Plan. It was adopted after considerable work, expense and public discussion. Now the public has every right to expect the Town to use the Plan to guide its land use decisions. That said, no plan is perfect. If the Town Board concludes that there are aspects of it that aren't working as well as they need to -- for example, if the Plan doesn't sufficiently encourage redevelopment of the Route 52 corridor -- then the Town Board should amend the Plan using a process similar to the one used to create it in the first place. Once agreement is reached on updates to the Plan, then it would be time to draft legislation to implement the agreed-to changes.

What's happened here is nothing like that. Out of nothing we suddenly see fully formed draft legislation that doesn't just fail to implement an amended Plan, it hardly acknowledges the Plan's existence. In bringing forward the OPOD proposal in this way, the Town Board has broken the promise of stability and predictability the Plan ostensibly represents. Regardless of the merits of the proposal, the process used to create the OPOD proposal is both wrong and wrongheaded.

Second: The OPOD proposal itself is a bad idea

Completely independent of the process used to develop it, there's the OPOD proposal itself. I think it's a terrible idea for two reasons.

Number one, the proposal doesn't follow the Comprehensive Plan. The Plan says, "The R-80 and R-40 residential zoning in Kent should not change." (Land Use and Zoning Policy 1). The Consulting Town Planner points out that adopting the OPOD doesn't change the zoning of any property. That’s true enough in the sense that no land is moved from one zone to another. Instead, the proposal changes the definition of the R-80 zone itself. In the existing definition, office parks, light industrial, and the other uses outlined in the OPOD draft are not permitted. With the proposed change, those uses are permitted so long as the property involved meets the OPOD criteria and the Town Board agrees. In my book, keeping the name of a zone and changing its definition is a zoning change, and adopting this one would be contrary to the Comprehensive Plan.

The second reason the OPOD proposal is a bad idea is that it undermines the very reasons for having zoning laws. Our zoning laws assure residents and businesses that land use patterns in the Town are well thought-out, stable and predictable over long periods of time. This gives residents and businesses the confidence they need to make large, long-term investments in our community. People and businesses don't invest where land use can suddenly and unpredictably change. Yet, that's exactly what the OPOD proposes for large sections of the Town. With the OPOD in place, no one with R-80 property near a county or state highway could reasonably predict what might happen to vacant land next door. Today its R-80 zoning permits only residential use, but tomorrow a warehouse, parking garage or factory could be okay. From a zoning point of view all it takes is a developer who puts together 25 acres, gains access to the road, and receives the nod from a majority of the Town Board. This is not how zoning laws are supposed to work.

One last thing on this topic. Proponents of the proposal have put forward the idea that because OPOD projects would need to go through all of the environmental vetting processes, be designed and constructed to conform to building codes and so on, the proposal is somehow less bad. That’s hogwash. The subject of the proposal is zoning, not construction standards, architectural guidelines or environmental impact processes. At the end of the obfuscation, we’re still talking about changing the definition of the R-80 zone. That’s a bad idea, plain and simple.

Third: The OPOD proposal doesn't accomplish the goal the Consulting Town Planner said it was designed to accomplish

At the May Planning Board workshop the Consulting Town Planner said that the OPOD proposal was motivated by the desire to encourage redevelopment of some of the commercial areas along Route 52. Many people, including me, agree with that goal. But the OPOD proposal is completely off target if that's its intent. The OPOD proposal applies to land zoned R-80, but none of the parcels along Route 52 that might benefit from redevelopment is zoned R-80. The OPOD simply wouldn't apply.

On the other hand as the Consulting Town Planner said at the Public Hearing, the OPOD proposal does apply to the undeveloped land to the north of the Town Center. But that's not redevelopment.

In summary, it’s my view that the OPOD proposal would not serve the interests of the Town, its residents, or businesses and should not be adopted. It’s also my view that, the Town Board would be well advised to address any land use issues it identifies using an open process that begins with changes to the Comprehensive Plan and ends with adopting legislation. Doing it that way is much more likely to generate public support for needed change and, at the same time, produce a better result.

Help stop this poorly thought-through proposal before it has a chance to wreck our neighborhoods. Attend the public hearing on June 21 at 7pm in the Town Hall. Speak out against the Office Park Overlay District proposal.