Champaign County Board Passes Land Resource Management Plan

A long-range plan to guide Champaign County regulation of rural land use won county board approval Thursday night with the support of all of the Democrats and half the Republicans.

The new Land Resource Management Plan covers a wide range of issues, with the goal of preserving Champaign County's prime farmland. But the focus of recent controversy had been limits on what development will be allowed on agricultural land "by right", that is, without county approval. As originally drafted, the plan limited building on farmland to one lot per 40 acres. But Barb Wysocki, the County Board's Democratic Land Use Committee Chair says that was modified during talks with Republicans over the last two weeks..

"Some were very adamant that the strict one-per-40, which is where we started, had virtually no support in the Republican caucus", said Wysocki, "which obviously was not going to work."

What apparently did work was a policy allowing two new lots per 40 acres of farmland by right, as long as no more than 3 acres of best prime farmland is developed. With that change added, six Republicans voted for the plan meant to guide county land use regulation for the next 20 years.

But Mahomet Republican John Jay doesn't feel the plan gets it right. While recent debate focused on how much farmland an owner could develop without seeking county permission, Jay says the problems with the plan go beyond that.

"Specifically property owner rights, obviously" said Jay. "But more importantly, it's overreached. And I'm not sure where we're going with this. You know, building codes and health and safety issues, and all the things that concern all of us, shouldn't be in a land use plan. A land use plan ought to be concise to land use."

Jay was one of the six Republicans voting against the Land Resource Management Plan.

Champaign County officials must now work out how to apply the plan to its ordinances and rules governing rural land use. They had struggled for years to find consensus for a comprehensive zoning review, before deciding to work out the Land Resource Management Plan as a guideline.

One of the six other Republicans who voted no, John Jay, says the Land Resource Management Plans' main problem is its overall scope --- one he says goes far beyond actual land use issues.