NEWTON COUNTY – The Newton County’s Board of Commissioners is continuing to work to develop an updated Unified Development Ordinance (UDO) for the county.

On Tuesday, Jan. 7, the board held a work session to hear a presentation on the UDO goals, schedule and assessment from Brian Mabry, a representative from consultant Kendig Keast Collaborative. The following day, the county held a community meeting where citizens of the county asked Mabry questions and raised their concerns.

The UDO will give the county an up-to-date one-stop document that outlines regulations for zoning, land use, design and other development policies. The UDO is the adopted legal document that helps the county implement its Comprehensive Plan. 

The intent of the commissioners is to ensure that their respective districts are outlined in a way that best suits their constituents’ different needs while balancing the big-picture necessities of the whole county. 

Mabry outlined several goals that they hope the UDO will accomplish. These objectives include:

• To be the primary regulatory tool for the implementation of the Newton County Comprehensive Plan
• To create more predictability for future development
• To align all development regulations so that they seamlessly work together 
• To include current best practices and revised development standards
• To consolidate development regulation into a single document with all regulations related to a specific topic in one place
• To create a more user-friendly ordinance

Perhaps the most discussed topic in recent meetings has been overdevelopment in Newton County, with commissioners and citizens alike giving their feedback on the increased growth throughout the county

Commissioner Stephanie Lindsey, District 3, said she is specifically concerned about addressing overgrowth in her district. Lindsey said she aims to explore restrictive overlays that will address overdevelopment along the western side of Newton County.

“What about a serious restrictive zoning for the area?” Lindsey said. “Is it permissible to have a particular area where there’s absolutely no multi-family housing at all?”

At the following day’s community meeting, many citizens gave their input into the UDO and highlighted their concerns.

Most commentators expressed negative feelings toward increasing development across the county, with most critiques aimed at District 3’s growth in recent years.

“District 3, the west side, needs its own specific plan to undo the damage,” said one citizen commenter. “We are a special case compared to the rest of the districts.

“If this doesn't result in something specific for District 3, then we as a county—you guys haven't done your job well. This can’t be another plan that just goes on a shelf. District 3 is unique, and we have to have a specific outcome for our district as a result of this process.”

At Lindsey’s insistence, the county may consider implementing aggressive and comprehensive restrictions on certain areas of the west side. This would bar developers entirely from building certain types of projects in specific areas, which would help the county try and keep neighborhoods more cohesive and intentionally planned as opposed to over-industrialized and crowded. 

“We have to examine the overlays and then put an overlay over those overlays that is going to supersede everything and cause there to be a prohibition of certain types of use,” Lindsey said.

The public commenters were unyielding in expressing their need for serious attention in the populous district.

Citizens from the more rural areas of the county also expressed discontent with growth spreading into their regions.

“On the Comprehensive Plan, it shows light industrial and heavy commercial going all the way down to Newborn, and that's not something I voted for or wanted,” a second citizen said. “It’s ruining the character of our whole state. Everywhere you go it’s like that, in the name of making Georgia the number one place to do business, and I’m not for that if it means we’ve got to ruin our state and if we’ve got to destroy our quality of life.”

Though nearly every commenter expressed a degree of discontent with the developments that have spread across the county, many also acknowledged that change and growth cannot be halted entirely, with one commenter admitting that if a county is “not growing,” then it is “dying.”

A consensus was formed among the citizens who want the local government to proactively control growth, choosing what specifically to allow as well as when and where to deny development. Though District 3 houses the most overdeveloped portions of Newton County, the attendees agreed some restrictive regulations must extend across the entire county.

“If you say you’re not doing any development in District 3, it's going somewhere,” another commenter said. “Into [Districts] 1, 2, 4 and 5.”

The public also raised some zoning concerns, displaying discontent with the classification of “mixed-use,” calling it too vague and saying that development applicants are abusing the term.

“Mixed-use is so vague, so we end up having three car washes within two miles of each other; we have storage units that are popping up between Rockdale and Newton County, so what are you putting in place?” said the first citizen commenter.

The consultants agreed that the UDO could address this issue by defining “mixed-use” more specifically or including distances of required separation in the report.

The commissioners and consultants agreed that the ordinance should be drafted in “plain English” so it is understandable by the average reader, giving the community more ability to understand the development process requirements.

“Having user-friendliness is what most places are looking for,” Mabry said. “Making it so that the average person can understand this document, that it has a good deal of graphics and tables and is still legally defensible but doesn't take an attorney to understand.”