Cheney updating zoning code

Council also directs company to look for other power sources

Thu., Aug. 14, 2008

By Lisa Leinberger lisal@spokesman.com (509) 459-5449

CHENEY – The Cheney City Council held a public hearing Tuesday regarding amendments to Title 22 in the city zoning code.

Brian Jennings, city community development director, presented a plan for updating the zoning code.

The proposed criteria of the plan will be that the zoning code will not conflict with the city’s comprehensive plan, it will correct language disagreements throughout the plan and correct any grammatical or punctuation errors.

The code was originally approved in the early 1970s and codified certain design elements, such as alleys and lot layout.

“Current review of the code revealed that some of the statutes regarding these elements were in conflict with recent practice and projects under review,” the city said in its written agenda for the meeting.

Jennings said that the project to fix the zoning codes should be done in December and it will remove the burden on city staff when they are reviewing codes.

Councilmember Teresa Overhauser asked Jennings if any of the language rewritten in the code will take energy conservation into consideration.

“We’d wait until next year when we are hoping to do a complete rewrite,” Jennings said.

In other business, the council agreed to provide the Northwest Requirements Utilities with a letter of intent allowing it to look for other sources of power for the city than the Bonneville Power Administration.

Councilmember Tom Trulove said he thought exploring other options is a good idea and the council unanimously passed the resolution.

It was also decided that NAI Black will be the listing and marketing agent for the new Cheney Research and Industrial Park, which had its groundbreaking earlier this week. The real estate company will be in charge of selling lots in the park.

The contract with NAI Black will last for one year, and from every sale, the agency will receive 6 percent of the selling price.

The council will next meet Aug. 26.

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