Land Use Lesson 7 : Solving Land Use Conflicts

Individuals and groups of people become engaged in land use issues within the local community. Communities have governmental agencies, such as planning commissions and zoning boards that address the proposed changes. Often the important issue with any kind of land use is not the actual land use itself, but where it is located. Some land uses have negative impacts on others. Our society needs jails, landfills, and heavy industry, but most people do not want to live next door. People want LULUs (Locally Undesirable Land Use) located NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard).

Zoning is one of the most important strategies local government uses to try to meet all of the community’s needs while minimizing conflict. Zoning areas as commercial, residential, industrial, and agricultural allows government to set up different regulations appropriate to each land use and helps minimize conflict among land uses and users. Car dealerships benefit from being together (so that people can shop among several nearby locations) and residential areas benefit from being away from the traffic.

Our society is constantly changing, and sets of rules or definitions of regions often have to change. Economic growth or decline, the development of new activities, or changes in individual wants and needs occur. People, businesses, and governments may all request changes.

A planning board may change land use requirements in two ways. First, it may change the zoning classification (i.e., from single-family residential to multiple-family residential). Often this is done as part of a periodic review of the Master Plan (usually revised every ten years or so.) Another way to change a land use or zoning is for someone to request a variance, or exception, to the rules.

The process that is followed by a community board, such as a zoning board, is an important part of reaching a decision. The board must be certain that civic principles are followed. This is an opportunity for students to follow Robert’s Rules of Order, a traditional set of rules for organizing and running meetings. Those procedures include calling the meeting to order, introducing the business on the agenda, and recognizing people and giving them “the floor” in order to present arguments regarding their position on the issue being discussed. School boards, city commissions, county commissions, faith-based groups, student governments, and nearly all organizations follow Robert’s Rules of Order. It is a process that students will follow in their public civic life. See References for a citation to Robert’s Rules of Order.