Kneehill County is asking for residents' input in setting the direction of the county’s development.
At the annual ratepayers meeting scheduled for April 10 at the Super 8 Motel in Three Hills, residents are being asked to provide feedback on a draft of the new Municipal Development Plan (MDP).
“Are there any items out there of any concern, that we may be overlooking? Even if there aren’t many changes, or it’s just wording, I think the responsible thing is to take it back to ratepayers and get their input,” said Bob Long, Reeve of Kneehill County.
The MDP is a document that addresses planning areas such as the preservation of agricultural lands, county residential development, commercial and industrial development, subdivision and development practices, environmental protection and enhancement, and inter-municipal relationships.
The MDP has been under review since the fall. At that time, residents were mailed questionnaires for their input.
According to Long, the document has not changed drastically.
“Most of what we did was redefining and wordsmithing,” said Long. “There aren’t really any big changes compared to the last one.”
The review was undertaken after recent developments in the county in the past several years.
“It had been awhile since we have done one. Since then, there had been some changes (in the county), so we wanted to go through our policies and procedures. Since we did the last one, there had been some developments, like wind energy, so we wanted to make sure what we were saying, doing, and going towards was still current,” said Long.
Should no changes come forth from the ratepayers meeting, it is expected Kneehill Council will see the final draft in the spring or early summer.
Afterwards, the next step will be to conduct a thorough review of the county’s Land Use Bylaw.
“We’re setting it up so our next step will be to review our Land Use Bylaw sometime next year. This is just the first step towards that,” said Long.
Residents interested in providing feedback or learning more are encouraged to attend the meeting at 6:15 p.m., on April 10, in the Super 8 Motel in Three Hills.
