Orono considers revising subdivision ordinance

ORONO – Consultants brought fresh ideas to residents and town officials Tuesday night during a public input session about revisions to the town’s planned unit development ordinance, which deals with housing developments.

After a brief overview of several issues that the council and planning board previously said they wanted addressed in the ordinance, the town’s planning consultant, Evan Richert of the University of Southern Maine, outlined three tools that can be used for flexible suburban and rural subdivision design.

. Residential clustering is designed to meet housing needs with less impact on open space and a reduced cost of roads and utilities. Clustering is very similar to what Orono now defines as planned unit development, and is primarily used in suburban or medium density locations, not urban settings such as Orono’s village area.

. Planned unit development, as defined by Richert, includes not just homes, but is a neighborhood that may consist of churches, businesses, and child care facilities.

. Conservation subdivisions are more for rural areas to preserve open space. Such subdivisions have been created in Freeport where more than 50 percent of the developable land is open or conserved space.

“There’s a family of tools, and it’s a growing family of tools,” Richert said Tuesday.

The purpose of the session was for residents to guide planners as to where and what types of development they would like to see, and Richert stated several times that those tools can be tailored to meet the specific needs of a community.

“We’re really getting to the meat of finding the best path for you at this point,” Jack Kartez, Richert’s co-worker and the meeting’s facilitator, said.

About 10 residents, in addition to planning board and council members, attended Tuesday’s session. Although many questions were asked and addressed, no final decisions were made.

The next step is to create a draft ordinance before going through public hearing processes with both the council and planning board, Town Manager Cathy Conlow said. She added that some tweaking likely will be done to the document during that process.

A moratorium on such developments expires near the end of September. While members of the two boards have said they hope not to have to extend the moratorium another six months, it is a possibility if revisions to the ordinance haven’t been completed.

“The goal is to get this done before the moratorium expires or to do it in a way that the moratorium doesn’t have to be extended for long,” Richert said.

Residents and town officials expressed opinions all across the board regarding what types of development should be allowed in Orono’s commercial, residential, and forestry and agriculture zones. The main concern remained, however, that the ordinance contain wording that will produce the kind of development it is meant to, particularly in terms of open space and density.

“I think we need to apply more stringent urban standards to [the ordinance],” Conlow said. “We need to have some teeth in the process.”