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Plan Commission votes unfavorable on proposed UDO, urges citizen-led rewrite and committee continuation
Summary
After extensive public comment and criticism of the process and draft language, the Owen County Plan Commission gave an unfavorable recommendation on the county's proposed Unified Development Ordinance and amended its motion to keep a citizen group engaged in rewriting by renaming it an ordinance committee.
The Owen County Plan Commission voted to send an unfavorable recommendation to the county commissioners on a proposed Unified Development Ordinance (UDO) and amended the motion to request that the citizen group working on ordinance text continue as an "ordinance committee" to review and propose specific ordinance changes for the county.
Public commenters and several commission members said the 240‑page draft is not tailored to Owen County, that the consultant process lacked sufficient daytime public involvement, and that portions of the draft contain provisions (such as sidewalk requirements and other standards) they consider inappropriate for predominantly agricultural parts of the county. Multiple speakers urged rejecting the draft in favor of a citizen‑driven rewrite or a chapter‑by‑chapter review to extract provisions the county actually needs.
Dora Brown, introduced as a longtime attendee of the prior process, told the commission she remained strongly opposed: “I am still very much opposed to accepting this UDO until it gets rewritten … the individuals who are going to rewrite it need to know the verbiage that we need.” Several other speakers, including members of the citizen committee and newly appointed township officials, expressed similar objections and asked the commission to stop the UDO as presented.
Plan Commission members and some commissioners said there are usable elements in the draft but that the document in its present form is too large and contained ambiguous language. The commission discussed fiscal and procedural problems raised by residents: the consultant contract was funded in part by county funds and in part by the redevelopment commission, and speakers asked whether the county should pay the remaining amount before deciding the draft's fate.
During debate the commission approved a motion to forward an unfavorable recommendation to the county commissioners. The motion was amended to add a recommendation that the existing citizen committee continue to work—under the new label "ordinance committee"—to produce targeted, county‑specific ordinance language that could be considered individually by the county commissioners. The amended motion passed; the meeting record did not include a detailed roll‑call tally in the public record.
Commissioners and staff outlined a path forward if the commissioners accept the unfavorable recommendation: extract provisions from the UDO that the public and governing officials agree are useful, then incorporate them into county ordinances through a public, chapter‑by‑chapter process with additional public meetings and review. Several speakers urged the Plan Commission and commissioners to make any future citizen committee meetings accessible (day/evening scheduling) and to provide clearer, searchable drafts on the county website.
Next steps: the Plan Commission will forward its unfavorable recommendation and the committee recommendation to the county commissioners; commissioners may decide to reject the UDO or to solicit a revised approach. The Plan Commission encouraged the public to submit consolidated written comments to the auditor’s or commissioners' offices to be included in the record.
