With today being the last interim meetings for legislative committees before the start of the session in January, we are getting a look at some bills that are being considered today. A few of those are related to housing and land use.
The most consequential would, I think, be a bill titled Utah Housing Amendments. This proposed bill would allow a city or county to create an overlay for any zone allowing residential use that must, at minimum, allow small lots (5,400 sf or smaller), and/or “diverse housing options;” that is, duplexes, triplexes, fourplexes, townhouses, and a number of other options. Within this overlay, when it is applied to undeveloped property, ownership may be deed-restricted to require owner-occupancy, or it may be required to have units that are affordable to buyers or renters at a certain income threshold. I’m wondering if that should have been an “and” in between this two provisions rather than an “or.”
The bill also makes some changes to the MIHP reporting requirements related to the overlay provisions, and a few others. Take a look and let us know your thoughts. The bill will be heard in the Political Subdivisions interim committee this afternoon, we’ll let you know how it goes.
There is also a bill proposed to modify the definitions and processes for adjusting property lines, titled Boundary Line Amendments. All I can say about this bill is, wow, really? The nitty gritty it gets into on adjusting property lines between owners, and the requirements it makes of local governments to review them, is rather mind-boggling. Who would come up with such a rubicks cube? To give you a clue as to why I’m reacting this way, the bill is 58 pages long! I’d love to hear comments on this one.
We also have a bill that makes some modifications to HTRZs – Housing and Transit Reinvestment Zone Modifications, and modifications to fix some problems and ambiguities with the new FHIZs – First Home Investment Zone Amendments.
I’ve mentioned in past posts the ideas that have been put forward by the LUTF, CHA, and UEOC, and those are supposedly going to get worked on now, but it will probably be a while before we see any concrete language on these.
And then there are other bills that may just show up unanticipated. We are getting a list of bills that have been requested by individual legislators. Let me provide you with some of the titles that we think may mean something for planners, and what little I may know about some of them.
Agricultural Tourism Building Amendments
Building Amendments
Housing Construction Amendments – this is a bill requested by Rep. Ray Ward, likely one of his two bills that we previewed in an earlier post dealing with external ADUs.
Property Rights Amendments
Residential Property Rights
Local Land Use Amendments – this is a bill request by Rep. Melissa Ballard, and likely has to do with something she talked to the LUTF about a few months ago. Essentially, she was proposing that property owners be vested for two year in the provisions of the zoning code in effect at the time a property is purchased or transferred. Wow. Talk about liberal vesting rules!
Riparian Amendments – bill requested by Rep. Bennion, who last year had a bill that would have required inclusion of an extensive riparian planning element in general plans. That bill failed. This may be another attempt at it.
Local Zoning Amendments
Municipal Incorporation Amendments
Residential Zoning Amendments – the other Ray Ward bill
Food Cart Amendments
Things are shaping up to make it a really interesting legislative session on the land use front – just what all you local planners out there need, eh?