As discussion over updates to the Fort Thomas zoning ordinance continues, city leaders have heard from residents concerned about the proposed process and outcomes.
The city has been updating its zoning ordinances for more than a year, and that work will continue for several months. In 2022, the city hired CT Consultants to lead the process. The project has been divided into four phases.
Phase one of the project involved assessing existing conditions and examining zoning and subdivision ordinances. From this, the consultant created a report and recommendations.
“During phase two, we created the revised report regulations, and the major changes from your current code were fleshed out. We concluded phase two in September of 2023,” Alisa Duffey Rogers, an architect and planner with CT Consultants, said during last month’s city council meeting. “This phase two draft shows how the updated regulations differ from your current existing regulations. In that draft, anything that was deleted is struck out. Anything that was added is bold and underlined.”
The city is now in what the consultants term “phase three” of the process, the point where the city works to formalize the proposed ordinance amendments and work on aligning the zoning map. A 444-page draft of the Unified Development Ordinance, known as UDO, bringing together all the proposed zoning ordinances and regulations, has been posted on the city’s website for review as part of the phase three process.
Requests for transparency, clarity, input
Several residents came to the meeting to voice their concerns. Resident Tiffany Huber presented a document she and other residents put together outlining their issues and making specific requests of council going forward. She said much of what has been proposed in the update does not accurately reflect the input and feedback from residents.
“We just wanted to make sure that our council people got 100% of what we were trying to say when it comes to the comprehensive plan,” Huber said. “When it comes to zoning, we want less density. We want minimal impact to the residential areas. We want significant green space and barriers between residential and non-residential zones…We want historic preservation, a small town feel — a city in a park, not a park in the city. We want to review and update the 2018 comprehensive plan to reflect true community input. We want to ensure the proposed UDO reflects true community input, especially zoning specifications to support less density.”
She went on to ask that the UDO document be streamlined to provide clarity on the proposed changes. While natural and gradual modernization is expected, she said, the current changes appear drastic and do not reflect the community’s input. She said resident surveys taken during the comprehensive planning process and after do not support many of the goals identified in the update.
Huber noted that residents have been asking for more transparency and communication overall. She outlined requests for the city:
- provide email alert notifications for those who want to sign up to be alerted to city meetings and events
- provide more time for notifications, going beyond just the minimum Kentucky Revised Statutes notification requirements
- videotaping of more city meetings such as Planning and Zoning meetings
- provide more timely and robust meeting agendas on the website
- use a survey tool, such as Survey Monkey, to gather input from a wider range of community members
City Administrator Matt Kremer asked Huber to email him to set a time to meet and go over the residents’ concerns.
Requests for outside review
Resident Peggy Maggio echoed Huber and the other residents’ input. She has been meeting with council members to discuss the zoning issues and had some requests concerning the phase three process.
She asked that council look at the ordinance document with the end goal in mind, the vision laid out by Huber and others of what residents want for their city. She asked the council to consider some specific items when reviewing the document, including making changes to some of the problematic areas of the proposed code, such as adding story restrictions on business district buildings and limiting the power of the zoning administrator to allow height variances.
She also reiterated a request made at the last council meeting to secure an outside legal review of the document.
Kremer said he has been researching outside consultants and conducting legal reviews in response to requests from council members and the community.
“I do have costs now for zoning reviews and legal reviews. It is something we have started looking at moving forward,” Kremer said. “In the last few weeks, I met with PDS [Planning and Development Services] in Kenton County. What they’ve been doing for the last four years is they’ve been working on 19 cities. They have an outside firm doing that…I went through their process and our process to see where we’re the same, where we’re different. I did get with two more local zoning groups…and for those, it’s between $5,000 and $25,000 depending on the scope.”
The question is how deep council would like the review, he said. A cursory review could identify “landmines,” things that could cause problems, but an in-depth review could identify more issues and include suggestions and alternatives.
He also spoke with three of the top Northern Kentucky zoning attorneys, he said. They said they could review the ordinances to check if they violate anything in the state constitution, but that would be fairly cut and dried.
Kremer asked the council to decide after it had reviewed the draft whether a review was needed and what level of depth it would require.
Requests for more detail, time
Council member Eric Strange said he and other council members have been working to better understand the extensive UDO document.
“Working through the city administrator, I’ve asked for a report from CT Consultants that looks at all of the major changes that have taken place since we started this process — so, all the way through, not from phase two to phase three changes, but anything we have existing today and where it stands in terms of the proposal at this point,” Strange said. “I want to get that so that we’re all literally on the same page in terms of what the major changes are.”
He said he had received a draft packet from the consultants, but he did not feel it provided enough detail, so he sent it back with a request for additional information. He has received a new 17-page draft back and is now looking it over to ensure it has the additional information the council needs. If it does, he said, he will then share it with all council members.
Andy Ellison, chair of the council’s Law, Labor and License Committee, said he wanted to ensure council and the public have time to review the document before moving forward with final discussion and approvals of the UDO.
“I think that is a great idea. And looking at how detailed it is, I would err on the side of caution,” Ellison said. “The reason I’m saying this is, if we wait a month before we get that, then we’ve just pushed everything back a month. I may still want to have an outside counsel look at this. Is there going to be a public review period? We shouldn’t be getting this in the middle of June, and then voting on it in July, which is the plan.”
Kermer responded that the plan is for the draft to be completed before the May council meeting, giving at least a month of review and discussion. Ellison asked that another meeting be planned as well to give the city the opportunity to present the plan to the Planning Commission.
Strange noted that council could begin immediately to look at some of the early decisions, such as changes in language outlining requirements and responsibilities of boards and committees, and a section on waivers modifications and equivalents. With that, council would have a better feel for whether and what level of depth might be needed of an outside review, he said.
A copy of the Unified Development Ordinance draft for phase three is available, along with other zoning documents, on Planning Commission page of the city’s website.