BY KALISHA MENDONSA
Citizens of Lacombe County are invited to attend a third, interactive round of public open houses to better understand the vision of the Municipal Development Plan (MDP).
Included in the MDP is the updated Land Use Bylaw (LUB), which helps residents to understand their property restrictions for future development.
On April 3rd, an open house will be held at the Lacombe County Office, from 12 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. where residents are encouraged to come and speak with officials about the drafted plans.
Dale Freitag, manager of planning services, said it is important for residents to take part in the open house events so that they may share their input and gain better understanding of these important documents.
“The MDP and LUB basically guide all of the development policies in the municipality. That includes everything from the development of your single-family dwelling, to multi-family developments, to a single industrial development to a commercial development - all of the rules that govern how people can build and subdivide in Lacombe County are included in these plans,” Freitag said.
“If there are areas that people feel need to be addressed or tweaked, these are the meetings they have to come to. We need resident input if they feel these plans need to be changed.”
So far, Lacombe County has done extensive work in reaching out to the community for input.
There were open houses, online surveys, live-voting response periods and more. All of these sessions helped Lacombe County council to organize and understand the needs of the citizens.
Freitag explained that the information gathered from these various sessions helped to shape the development plans thus far. He explained the policies being brought forward have been created with residents in mind, and now it’s time for the residents to give their final notes.
The event is an informal, free-flowing open house where residents can drop by anytime between noon and 8:30 p.m. to ask questions directly to the available planners.
Planners from Lacombe County will have various booths set up so that they can provide a one-on-one experience with residents to ensure the best possible understanding of policies.
“These plans basically help determine the opportunities people have for their land,” Freitag said.
The MDP and LUB are separate documents. The MDP is an over-arching set of policies, and the LUB plan is where residents will find more specific rules and regulations in terms of what they can or cannot do on their land.
Freitag said he hopes to see residents coming forward at the April 3rd event at the Lacombe County office, but also to the following events on April 6th at Gilby Hall, as well as the final open house on April 10th at Tees Hall.
Additional information is available at mdp.lacombecounty.com.
kmendonsa@lacombeexpress.com