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Planning Board sets public input rules

Written by Laura Douglass, Times Reporter

Thursday, 18 February 2010

    Public comment — how long and how flexible should it be — again dominated discussion of the Moore County Planning Board during its Thursday, February 4 meeting.
    Following a contentious public hearing of the proposed Pine Forest Planned Unit Development [PUD] in December, the Board has been steadily reexamining and working to adopt consistent comment procedures. Last month, the Board unanimously approved moving the public comment period on the monthly agenda from the end to ,the beginning of each meeting. Discussion continued in February to determine appropriate limits and protocol for public speaking periods for both public hearings and general meetings.
    Seizing the opportunity to address the Board early in the meeting, former chair and member Harry Huberth recommended flexibility.
    “Regarding a policy of speaking during public hearings, we are chasing a problem that does not exist. We do not limit the proponents time – that’s where we get a great deal of information before a decision,” said Hurberth. “This Board always had a reputation that win or lose, people felt like they had a fair hearing because they were allowed to vent frustrations.”
    He asked the Board to give public comment careful consideration and warned against setting ironclad time limits.

    Planning Director Joey Racz-kowski then presented the Board with two public comment options; one modeled on the well-established Board of County Commissioners [BOC] policy, and a second simplified and more flexible model.
    He recommended adopting the BOC protocol to eliminate confusion and maintain consistency between the two boards and, after discussion, the Board agreed on a split vote. Public comment will be limited to three minutes for each speaker and one additional three minute period, if yielded by another signed speaker. The maximum public comment period is thirty minutes.
    However, when the Planning Board moved on to setting policy and time limits at public hearings, all agreed that a longer period per speaker was preferable.
     “I got flooded with calls when we said we should limit the time – both positive and negative comments,” said member Ricky Lea. “We do not need to model on the Board of Commissioner’s, our Board is a little more informal. If people come here, we can afford to give them a little more time.”
    Planning Chair Martha Blake argued in favor of limiting time at the podium, but accepted Lea’s suggestion that five minutes with one additional five minute period yielded was appropriate.
    “A person should be able to say everything they want to say in ten minutes,” Blake said. “I believe in listening to everybody. Everyone has a right to speak their opinion, but we also need to have a little bit of order.”

Other Business
    In other business on Thursday, February 4, the Moore County Planning Board:
    Introduced new member Robert Hayter, a registered landscape architect from Southern Pines.
    Heard from Raczkowski that staff are working with local outreach groups to promote the 2010 Census. Forms will be mailed in March.
    “We’re trying to get the word out that it is critical for the citizens of Moore County to fill out the surveys. A lot of federal funding is tied to the population we serve especially the social and health services we receive,” said Raczkowski.

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