Land redevelopment exception amendments postponed indefinitely

In August, seven amendments to the Land Development Code came before the Environmental Commission for review and were met with dissent from the citizens in attendance and trepidation from the commissioners. During the meeting, commissioners voted the amendments down 7-2. On Oct. 4, Chuck Lesniak, the city’s environmental officer, returned to the commission to announce that he would request to indefinitely postpone the proposed amendments to help avoid any confusion with the changes occurring under CodeNEXT. However, he said, “We do think there’s a lot of value in amending the redevelopment exception, but people are not taking advantage of that.” Therefore, he said, the city will readdress the amendments and recommence the stakeholder process sometime next year. He did note that these amendments will remain a priority because “the status quo is unacceptable.”