Interim Zoning Ordinance

The City Council adopted the Interim Zoning Ordinance on May 1, 2018.

The proposed Interim Zoning Ordinance represents the first phase update to the Zoning Ordinance and will ensure that new development is consistent with the General Plan, and provide predictability and certainty for property owners and developers during a “transition” period until the final comprehensive zoning, phase II, is adopted. The interim document will also allow the City to evaluate proposed standards while developing the final comprehensive zoning. 

Note: The Downtown core area, not a part of this update, is covered by a separate regulatory document, The Downtown Specific Plan. A separate, concurrent effort is underway to update this document.

Related Documents

  1. Interim Zoning Ordinance
  2. Exhibit B - Comprehensive Use Table
  3. Interim Zoning Map - 8.19.20

Additional Information

The City intends to prepare a comprehensive update to the Zoning Ordinance, however, that effort will take up to two years. In the interim, the City must adopt a set of procedures and standards that will provide a legal basis for the development review process for those areas with inconsistencies between the General Plan and the existing Zoning Ordinance. The City Council has adopted the Interim Zoning Ordinance to cover areas that required an immediate update to ensure consistency with the General Plan.

There are large areas in the City where the existing Zoning Ordinance will continue to apply. As example, most existing residential areas, large portions of the Industrial Zone and Spring Lake are not affected. The areas where new land use designations were approved and where new zoning is required are located primarily along major street corridors (East Street, Main Street and Kentucky Avenue) and over a portion of the west Industrial area, (west of Pioneer Avenue and North of Main Street). New land use designations not reflected in existing zoning are the Corridor Mixed Use, Corridor Mixed Use with a Light Industrial Flex Overlay, Community Commercial, Regional Commercial, Regional Commercial with a Light Industrial Flex Overlay, as well as Industrial with a Light Industrial Flex Overlay.

The General Plan is an overarching policy document while the Zoning Ordinance is a regulatory document that ensures the implementation of the General Plan’s goals and polices through the application of specific criteria and standards. A General Plan is often described as the constitution for a city. The Zoning Ordinance typically regulates uses, lot development standards (allowed building height, lot coverage, and distance a building may be from a street) as well as required design features (as example, in some case that a building entry must face a street).