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Planning commission adopts board-of-adjustment rule changes and corrects regulatory citation used in pending litigation
Summary
The Elbert County Planning Commission approved updates that align its board-of-adjustment rules with state statute and fixed a persistent citation typo (G→H) staff say is implicated in ongoing litigation over a denied storage facility application. Both measures were approved by voice vote and will be forwarded toward BOCC consideration.
Elbert County’s Planning Commission voted to adopt revisions that align the county’s board-of-adjustment provisions with state statute and to correct a typographical citation in the zoning regulations that staff say has legal consequences for a pending court appeal.
County attorney Lance told the commission that much of the redline text is verbatim statutory language intended to correct inconsistencies in the existing regulations. “What’s in front of you while it looks like a lot of red is really a lot of recitation of the statute that is what the reg should have said in the first place,” Lance said during the staff presentation. He described two principal changes: restating the statute’s voting thresholds for boards of adjustment and adding a simple, explicit hearing procedure.
The revisions clarify that a board of adjustment may be composed of three or five members; under statute a three-person board must act unanimously and a five-person board must have four votes to approve an application. Lance said the regulations also explicitly allow the Board of County Commissioners to sit as the board of adjustment (a practice the county has used) and provide a short, staff-present/applicant-respond/public-testimony procedural sequence in the regulations themselves rather than relying solely on standing practice.
Separately, the commission approved a narrow but consequential correction in Article 3 replacing an incorrect subsection reference (G) with the intended subsection (H). Staff explained the erroneous reference meant the cited approval criteria could not be found in the cited subsection, a problem that was raised in district-court litigation challenging the denial of an application. As Lance put it, “Small typo with ramifications.” He told the commission that the typo had been identified during the defense of the county’s denial of the Peak Vista RV storage facility and that correcting the citation was necessary to ensure the regulations direct readers to the proper approval criteria.
A motion to adopt the board-of-adjustment changes was moved, seconded and approved by the commission. The commission also moved, seconded and approved the typo correction.
What happens next: staff indicated the corrected and redlined regulations will be taken forward for BOCC consideration; Lance and staff said they will review editorial consistency before the materials go to the board. The commission discussed related formatting and Roman-numeral fixes that are part of a broader corrections package and noted some changes may also be presented to the BOCC for formal adoption.
Votes and procedure: the motions were made and seconded on the record and carried by the commission during the meeting. The planning commission confirmed a quorum at roll call; staff recorded attendance for forwarding materials to the BOCC. The commission did not identify individual movers in the hearing record when the two votes were taken (motions were announced from the floor and seconded).
