The Carrboro Board of Aldermen will consider the possibility of undertaking the development of a comprehensive plan for the town at its first meeting of the new year Tuesday.
Carrboro Mayor Lydia Lavelle said this is an idea that has been considered by the board for several years.
“We have lots and lots of plans,” Lavelle said. “This idea of pulling them all together and coming up with a town-wide comprehensive plan. Pulling together, I’m sure, a lot of what we have in all of these different plans, but then also just engaging the community in a new exercise of, where do we see our physical land going in the years to come?”
Lavelle said she believed “the last land-use planning effort for the town as a whole was last completed as a whole in 1977.” But she added there were other smaller efforts in the decades to follow leading up to Vision 2020, which is often referenced but Lavelle said does not qualify as a comprehensive plan.
“I do think the idea of one document would be unbelievable,” Lavelle said. “But number two, I think it might help inform developers and decisions made by the board in an even more thoughtful way than what we have right now.”
Lavelle said there were several questions that the town needed to address as a community regarding density, preservation and land-banking efforts for affordable housing.
If the board decides to move forward with developing a comprehensive plan, Lavelle said, “it would be a massive undertaking, even in our little town which digs very deep into everything.”
Tuesday night’s meeting will also be the first meeting with all seven board seats filled since Michelle Johnson resigned last year. Barbara Foushee was elected to fill that seat in November’s election.
Tuesday’s meeting is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. in Carrboro Town Hall.
