This is a time for Forsyth County citizens to be especially interested and involved in their government process. Rewriting the Zoning Ordinance and other County Ordinances will significantly shape the development of our County. These ordinances will be the laws governing future County zoning actions. Therefore, now is the time for citizens' influence to be exerted.

Forsyth County has been growing rapidly and will likely face continued growth pressures. How should that growth be managed? What will the future Forsyth County look like? How fast will the County grow? What will be the quality-of-life for its citizens? The plans that have been developed, and the new Zoning Ordinance to be created, will profoundly influence the answers to these questions.

In 1995 the Board of Commissioners accepted the Vision 20/20 Quality Growth Strategy that was produced by a representative cross section of Forsyth County citizens. The Master Land Use and Development Plan was then created and finally accepted by the Board of Commissioners in mid 1998. These plans set the general direction for Forsyth County development, and determine the future uses of land in different parts of the County. The plans also identify the density of future development and lay the groundwork for controlling the County's growth rate.

There are two goals in the new Master Land Use and Development Plan that I think are most important to the future quality-of-life in Forsyth County. One goal deals with controlling the County's average residential density to one housing unit per acre. The other goal sets an ultimate County build-out population total at 225,000 to 275,000 people.

The Board of Commissioners held a Public Forum on Monday, October 12, 1998, to receive input about how to proceed. It appears that the Board will accomplish the rewriting of the Zoning Ordinance through a couple actions. First, it will hire outside professional specialists to create the new Zoning Ordinance. Second, the Board will establish a committee of a representative cross section of Forsyth County citizens to be advisors to, and a sounding board for, the professionals.

The citizens assigned to the advisory committee should represent the breadth of the special interests in the County, keeping in mind the approximate County population proportion of each special interest. That will result in some committee members having opposing views, at least initially, but one of the reasons for the committee is to try and recognize all significant viewpoints and work towards narrowing the differences. The process should produce a zoning ordinance that better represents, and is more acceptable to the diversity of our citizenry.

Because the resultant Zoning Ordinance has huge financial implications for the development industry, the development industry will be organized and very involved in the process. Experience convinces me that there is a strong bias in the development industry towards dense development and fast growth. On the other hand, many citizens are in favor of less dense development and slower growth, but average citizens are usually not nearly as interested or involved. However, this is precisely the time for all citizens to be interested because the laws governing our future quality-of-life are being determined. I have seen many past cases of zoning requests, to which there were citizen objections, but the Zoning Ordinance did not allow the government to satisfy the objections. The time to think through the considerations we want in the Zoning Ordinance is now when the law is being created.