On July 25 there's a terse correction (click to enlarge and read):
We were unable to attend the last parish council meeting and must rely on reports from friends.
Citizens asked questions, and the theme of the replies was mostly, "The law doesn't say what you think it says." Pray tell, then, why don't they rewrite it?
One landowner south of town asked why large farming properties were included in the map as Suburban Residential. She was told that she lived near town, so she's suburban - doesn't explain the "residential," does it? And that the map was drawn to include in that designation properties with city water. However, the area in question does not have city water; they have parish water, I discovered via a phone call.
The council members and planning commission had no current map at the meeting.
A comment equating the zoning law with communism got applause from the audience. The room was packed to overflowing.
There was a comment made by somebody on the council - maybe Toye? - that the parish is expecting a huge amount of growth. I disagree. Like many others, I believe the post-Katrina boom is over.
I, too, am in an area apparently designated "Suburban Residential" by the zoning map. No, it doesn't affect me now. But it will very effectively limit the number of buyers for my property if I decide to sell. On suburban residential, you cannot have horses or livestock. One of the reasons to move out of the city and into the country is to have horses, a few chickens, maybe raise a pig every year - activities that are prohibited in the SR district.
This is a bad law.
Go to this page and email the council members to vote No.
From the dead-tree version of Sunday's Daily News:
Washington Parish residents wanting clarification of the proposed Land Use plan - which is 381 pages in its current state - have one more opportunity to try and get their questions answered.[...] Opponents of the plan, who have become more and more vocal in the criticisms of the plan and their call to take more time to fine-tune it, are expected to turn out in force.
It is found that non-agricultural uses when contiguous to farmland can affect how an agricultural use can be operated, which can lead to the conversion of agricultural land to urban, suburban, or other non-agricultural use. [You buy property outside city limits and there's a farm across the street, it's glaringly obvious. And you shouldn't be able to make the farmer shut off his tractor or quit fertilizing.] It is a goal of the Parish Comprehensive Plan to preserve agricultural land in the jurisdiction that is not otherwise identified in the Comprehensive Plan as necessary for development.
It is the policy of the Parish to preserve and encourage agricultural land use and operation within the jurisdiction, and to reduce the occurrence of conflicts between agricultural and non-agricultural land uses and to protect public health, safety, and welfare. [Why are you trying to designate a bunch of land used in agriculture as Suburban Residential, then? One of your pals wanna put up a subdivision?]
It is the policy of the Parish to notify applicants for building permits for buildings or land use permits for uses on non-agricultural land abutting agricultural land or operations with notice about the Parish’s support of the preservation of agricultural lands and operations. An additional purpose of the notification requirement is to promote a good neighbor policy by informing prospective builders and occupants of non-agricultural land adjacent to agricultural lands and operations of the effects associated with residing or operating activities close to agricultural land and operations. [Because they can't look next door or across the street and notice the cows and horses? Sheesh.] Another purpose of this Ordinance is to reduce the loss of agricultural resources in the jurisdiction by limiting the circumstances under which agricultural operations on agricultural lands may be deemed a nuisance. [Yeah, you're gonna limit that by calling a bunch of agricultural land "Suburban Residential" and driving out the farmers.]
It is further the policy of the Parish to require all new developments adjacent to agricultural land or operations to provide a buffer to reduce the potential conflicts between agricultural and non-agricultural land uses. By requiring a minimum 150-foot agricultural buffer on abutting non-agricultural lands, the Parish finds it will be helping to ensure prime farmland remains an agricultural use. Buffer requirements are further outlined in subsections of section 4-3.
I've been sayin' for about 14 months now that you couldn't get me to live in most parts of New Orleans unless my house was on pontoons.
Now somebody else has the right idea:
There are existing precedents of cost-effective amphibious houses, or houses that normally rest on the ground but float on buoyant foundations during a flood, both abroad in the Netherlands and at home along the rivers and bayous of South Louisiana. Why not capitalize on the advantages of buoyant foundations in the rebuilding of New Orleans and flood-prone areas throughout South Louisiana?Why not, indeed?
Speech codes. Censorship. Enforced political conformity. Hostility to diversity of opinion. Sensitivity training. We usually associate such things with the worst excesses of fascism and communism, not with the American universities that nurtured the free speech movement. But American higher education bears a disturbing resemblance to the totalitarian societies that are anathema to our nation’s ideal of liberty. Evan Coyne Maloney’s documentary film, Indoctrinate U, reveals the breathtaking institutional intolerance you won't read about in the glossy marketing brochures of Harvard, Berkeley, Michigan, Yale, and hundreds of other American colleges and universities.Put your name on the list to get a screening in our area here. Bogalusa will be on the map as soon as they count my vote ;-).
