- The New Comprehensive Zoning Ordinance
(How Changes to Park Zoning in the New CZO Could Impact You and Your
Favorite Park!)
- Who is responsible for these changes to the new CZO?
THE NEW COMPREHENSIVE ZONING ORDINANCE:
How Changes to Park Zoning in the New CZO Could Impact You and Your
Favorite Park!
The City Planning Commission is sponsoring an Open House for Orleans
Parish residents, elected officials and members of the business and civic
community to review the final draft of the City's new zoning maps and
revised Comprehensive Zoning Ordinance:
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 15, 2002
11 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Municipal Training Academy, 401 City Park Avenue
Why it is Important for you to Express and Opinion on the new CZO
The CPC claims that this "is a call for everyone to play a role in
planning for the future of your neighborhood" and that "your participation
is very important". Unfortunately, it remains unclear whether the vehement
public objections to the proposed zoning changes for parks that were
raised last spring in the zoning workshops have been either respected or
addressed in this final draft.
THESE ZONING CHANGES WILL ALLOW FAST-FOOD, STANDARD AND COCKTAIL LOUNGE
RESTAURANTS IN AUDUBON PARK AND CITY PARK!
Please try to attend the Open House if you can, and register your concerns
over these elements in the new CZO. Specifically, the City Planning
Commission needs to be aware that citizens are paying attention to the
following:
- Are public objections being recorded and incorporated into the CZO
text?
- After the public comments at the spring workshops, did Planning
Commission staff recommend that the zoning matrix of the new draft CZO be
changed to "allow restaurants in large parks as CONDITIONAL use rather
than as permitted use" (under the current CZO, they are not permitted at
all)? This would at least force any such project to go through Planning
Commission analysis, public comment, and Planning Commission Board
recommendation before being approved or rejected by the City Council.
- When, for the benefit of the public, will the Planning Commission
outline the extent to which public comments from previous workshops and
this Open House were allowed to inform the final draft of the text and
maps of the new CZO?
WHO'S RESPONSIBLE FOR THESE CHANGES TO THE NEW CZO?
Both Ron Forman, CEO of the Audubon Nature Institute, and Bob Becker, CEO
of the City Park Improvement Association, have strongly advocated
modifications to the new Comprehensive Zoning Ordinance to provide the
"flexibility" that will enable them to place more commercial,
revenue-generating facilities into our parks. Both have also downplayed
the strong public concerns, as expressed at the numerous public review
meetings on the Parks, Recreation & Open Space Element of the Master Plan,
about the amount of public parkland already being consumed by golf courses
and commercial facilities within our parks. Obviously, if the new CZO is
approved with the changes that allow virtually any kind of restaurant into
public parks as permitted uses, SaveAudubonPark's lawsuit appealing the
BZA decision to grant the ANI a permit for the clubhouse restaurant would
be rendered moot.
At stake in the new CZO is not only the future of our major urban parks,
but the strength and protection of our city's zoning codes. It's bad
enough that the zoning regulations in New Orleans' current CZO are
routinely circumvented by individuals and corporations who consider
themselves above such mundane rules; but it's worse when these same
individuals and corporations can pull end runs around the zoning code's
protections by using their power and influence to quietly weaken the
restrictions written into the new CZO. Zoning violations should not be
rewarded, whether they are committed by a drugstore owner attempting a
commercial expansion into a residential neighborhood, or a management
corporation illegally building a restaurant in a public park.
For more information on the new CZO or the Open House, contact City
Planning at 565-7000.
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