Liberty County commissioners approve UDO amendments, delay tougher paving standard until July 1

Liberty County commissioners on Thursday held a public hearing and agreed to adopt a package of amendments to the county's Unified Development Ordinance (UDO), approving most changes to take effect April 1 while delaying a new, stricter pavement standard until July 1.

The amendments revise allowable land uses, parking and subdivision rules, utility connection distances, landscaping and street standards. County planning staff told commissioners the package adds a new "residential-commercial" use, restores language restricting where recreational vehicles may be parked and revises thresholds and construction standards for subdivisions and streets.

County planning staff said the residential-commercial category "allows a combination of, as the name implies, residential and commercial uses with limitations within either the same building or in separate buildings on the same property." The UDO package also reintroduces language prohibiting RVs from being parked in front yards outside RV parks and says "it also does not allow anybody to live in that, use that RV for, living purposes, if it's not in an RV park," the planner said.

Other technical changes include raising the size threshold that triggers a required lighting photometric plan from 12 to 20 parking spaces, adding a certification block for planning commissioner signatures on final plats, and revising maintenance-bond language so the county receives the full two-year maintenance warranty for improvements constructed after final plat approval.

The amendments align county water connection requirements with the state Department of Health: the staff presentation said the county will require connection to a municipal system when it is within 1,000 feet rather than the prior 500 feet. Subdivision minimum lot sizes for on-site septic systems were changed to a half-acre minimum for projects of up to 50 lots and a one-acre minimum for subdivisions over 50 lots (higher amounts would apply where the Department of Health requires them). Planning staff said those minimums replace the previous 3-acre and 5-acre thresholds.

On streets, the UDO package raises the pavement standard for local and collector streets to an 8-inch subbase with a 2-inch superpave asphalt wearing surface (the county's prior standard was presented to commissioners as a 6-inch subbase and 1.5-inch superpave). Commissioners and staff discussed the cost impact for developers; county staff recommended a delayed effective date for the paving change to give projects already in design time to adapt.

After discussion, the board agreed to return the item for additional review in March and adopt the overall UDO amendments effective April 1, except for the paving provision, which the board set to become effective July 1 in Liberty County. A commissioner motion to set the paving implementation date was moved and supported on the floor; no roll-call vote or tally was recorded in the transcript.

Planning staff said the UDO amendments also cover hydrant clearance zones, require developers to supply and install traffic-control signs (stop, speed-limit and other regulatory signs) to county standards, remove a fixed inlet-spacing table in favor of a gutter-spread standard for street drainage, and tailor utility- and stormwater-easement widths to the facility type rather than a single 30-foot standard.

The planner said the draft had already passed some neighboring jurisdictions and that several local engineers and builders had reviewed the changes. Commissioners asked staff to re-notify builders and to return the item in March for final action. Planning staff noted two subdivisions were currently pending that could be affected by the pavement change and urged the July 1 implementation to reduce the need for waiver requests. No members of the public signed up to speak during the hearing.

The board's action leaves the county with a UDO that increases flexibility on mixed-use development, tightens some construction and utility standards to reflect state public-health rules, restores specific parking rules for RVs, and raises pavement requirements for new local and collector streets with a phased-in start date.

The county planning staff said they are aiming for the April 1 effective date for the bulk of the changes and July 1 for the paving standard; they also noted municipal adoption in other jurisdictions remains pending.