Why Springfield residents should care about the first ‘community development code update’

Holman: Great to be here, Michele.

Q: So what does the city mean when they say they’re going forward with a community development code update?

A: So Michele, I have a two-part answer for that question. The first side of it is that we should keep in mind the Springfield metro area is growing. Census data shows we grew more than 3 percent in population from 2020 to 2023. So Springfield had the fastest growth rate for all of the big and small metros in the state of Missouri. And that growth percentage is actually bigger than the percentage for the population increase of the whole planet Earth for that time period. I actually looked that up with United Nations data. So coming off the pandemic, a lot of people and businesses want to be here in Springfield, and that means land developers will want to leverage that demand to build new commercial buildings, new single-family, multi-family homes and so forth.

When it comes to the actual City of Springfield, their job is to manage all of that growth & development for the sake of the public good. Recently I interviewed Steve Childers, he’s director of the planning & development department of the City of Springfield.

“The comp plan is the vision, that’s Forward SGF and the community development code, or the zoning code, as a lot of people refer to it, that is your regulatory document.”

So when you hear the phrase “community development code update,” it might be simpler for our listeners to just think of this in terms of planning and zoning. This is big effort to modernize Springfield city zoning code for the 21st century, the first big code update since 1995. And actually on the official paperwork, it’s called the Springfield Land Development Code.

Q: What are some of the major features of the new code?

A: Michele, I also interviewed a Springfield man named Kevin Evans. And Kevin is actually a geology professor here at Missouri State University, and he’s involved with a new organization called the Springfield Urban Neighborhood Group. You can actually find them on Facebook if you search for The SNUG. Like, snug as in snuggle. And Kevin told me he’s been following the Forward SGF plan and the new regulations pretty closely. And for Kevin, Forward SGF and the code update are important in terms of supporting strong neighborhoods, as well as the city’s stated goal to promote place-making. Let’s hear from Kevin.

“If something is traditional neighborhood, keep it that way. So, so we okay, we’re, I’m a little biased, right? Because I’m in University Heights. I live a block away from the best park in the entire city, and it’s like, I worked my entire life just to be able to afford to live there. There are other people that have worked their entire lives just to be able to afford to live within this community that we love. And so Forward SGF says, keep it the same there, but let’s make mixed for this area, or let’s do concentrated sort of efforts in other areas. Let’s do that.”

Q: Do we know what that looks like for the city, practically speaking?

A: Well, when I interviewed Steve Childers with the planning department recently, he told me that part of this is just to have better checklists in terms of all the rules and regulations for new development projects. He also said the city wants to be more wholistic in terms of thinking about land use. So if the zoning process emphasizes designing the different land uses to be common-sense, if the process tries to balance all of the different interests and concerns of the different stakeholders involved – so think families, neighborhoods, businesses, taxpayers, developers — then the city thinks they can create win-win situations.

The code also has less of an emphasis on what’s sometimes called “traditional Euclidean zoning.”

Q: That’s a mouthful!

A: It is! It is a super-mouthful, I did not have it on my bingo card for today that we’d be referencing ancient Greek geometry nerds, but here we are. All that phrase means — Euclidean zoning — is the new code will have less of that, less of a focus on more traditional zoning that really tries to separate out the different kinds of land use in a very strict way, so for example traditional zoning wouldn’t necessarily allow retail or offices and single-family homes and multi-family homes… all in the same neighborhood on top of each other.

But with this code update, the city wants to emphasize that if you put in different kinds of transitional buffer zones, like maybe multifamily homes or duplexes and green space in-between commercial spaces and single-family houses, then all those things could be situated pretty close together. If you listen to everyone’s concerns while going through the development & design process, then new projects with different land uses can be intertwined in the fabric of the city as a whole.

Q: Okay Greg, so this seems to be a good question here: Why should ordinary people who are really busy with their jobs and their families and other things in their lives care about all of this?

A: You read my mind. Because that was like, literally a question I asked Steve Childers with the city. And let’s hear from him again.

“We all get very wrapped up in our situations, our challenges, our opportunities, but there’s a bigger world out there, and what I do can affect you, and what my neighbor does can affect me, and what happens down at the end of my street, which may be several blocks away, or maybe it’s the place that I go grocery shopping, or maybe it’s to place the Road I have to travel to go to church, or maybe it’s the park that I walk to on a greenway trail. Those are all things that affect you and affect the everyday person.”

Steve also said, and I think that this is notable, that he doesn’t necessarily think every person in town is going to notice effects of the new zoning code in a really direct way. But I will say that as we’ve reported on confrontations between neighborhoods and developers in Springfield, zoning has been a real focus in Springfield over the past several years.

And that comes whether that’s in different parts of the Galloway neighborhood on the southeast side, or University Heights closer here to campus, or elsewhere in the city. Steve really emphasized that as a city official, he’s trying to balance all of these stakeholder interests within the rules, rather than take sides for developers or people who want to preserve their neighborhoods. I think he and his coworkers are hoping for more win-wins, instead of perceived winners and losers.

Q: Last question: What are the next steps with this zoning code update?

A: Right, so the city says 2025 will likely include a “testing period” to iron out the kinks, and the code will be fully effective beginning January 1, 2026.

But first it actually has to get approval according to the city charter. The code update draft will go before the Springfield Planning & Zoning Commission at 6:30 p.m. this coming Thursday, February 13. They meet at the Springfield Regional Police-Fire Training Center off Battlefield Road.

Then in March, the proposal is going to get its public hearing and an an up-or-down vote at the Springfield City Council meetings on March 10 and March 24. And they are also at 6:30 p.m. at the Police-Fire Training Center, off Battlefield Road.

So for people who want to tell Planning & Zoning and City Council about their opinions on all of this, mark February 13 and March 10 on your calendars. I would expect City Council is likely to vote to approve the code.

Now in the meantime, anybody can go online to read all of the draft code articles and get the city’s, sort of, explanation and promotion of the community development code update. You want to visit forwardSGF.com/initiative3.

Q: Well, Gregory thanks, this is all really great information.

A: It’s been a pleasure. I want to say I really appreciate everyone in our audience for keeping up with public affairs here in the Ozarks. This is one of the more abstract topics, but it promises to have a huge effect on the city of Springfield, potentially for two decades.

Q: Definitely. Well for KSMU News, I’m Michele Skalicky.

This article was originally published by a www.ksmu.org . Read the Original article here. .