Every 10 years, Yavapai County puts together a Comprehensive Plan outlining zoning goals for the unincorporated areas in the county.
The county has for the past decade been operating on the 2012 plan. In the past few months, the process for work on the new one has begun.
“I believe in looking toward the future, so this is the 2032 update,” said Yavapai County Director of Development Services David Williams, who is leading the effort to develop a new plan. “This is going to carry us through 2032.”
The plan applies land use rules only to unincorporated areas. Municipalities such as Cottonwood, Camp Verde, Sedona and Clarkdale are not covered by the Yavapai County Comprehensive Plan, but unincorporated communities such as Cornville, Rimrock and the Village of Oak Creek are.
According to Williams, the 2012 plan, which was written at a low point during the Great Recession of last decade, was developed with the intention of encouraging growth in what- ever ways possible, at a time when there was little development. As a result, that plan gave more leeway to developers and had fewer restrictions on land use, something that some residents have complained about in the years since.
“It was written from the point of view of trying to stimulate any growth anywhere to try to get out of the recession,” Williams said. “There were large swaths of land that were just listed as rural, or municipal growth area.”
According to Williams, the goal for the next version of the YCCP is to focus much more on “targeted growth,” with the intention of listening to local communities and figuring out what kind of growth they want in their own areas, and divvying up parts of the county for residential, commercial or industrial zoning, rather than encouraging growth for its own sake.
“I would hope that the new plan does have a little more detail about density, and what the specific requirements might be, for especially new developments,” said Judy Miller, a member of the board for the Cornville Community Association, a nongovernmental nonprofit, who is serving as the coordinator for her group’s Cornville Vision Plan, which might be used by county officials. “One of the reasons why we’re doing the vision documents is to begin to get ideas about those kinds of subjects in order to feed them to the county so that they can start with some basic data from the communities as they begin the planning effort, so we’ll see what we hear from our people.”
“I think the last comprehensive plan did not have the level of community involvement,” Williams said. Williams said he is trying to work with the Cornville Community Association, Big Park Regional Coordinating Council and Beaver Creek Community Association in order to make sure that these local nongovernmental nonprofits feel that they have been heard.
“This is the third time that our community has undergone this process,” Janet Aniol of the Beaver Creek Community Association wrote in an email. “So, we feel that we have a good foundation to work with. Our last community plan had the requirement of being labeled a vision. We will be updating Vision 2020 to our Community Plan 2032. The Beaver Creek Community Association has the responsibility of sponsoring and directing the update.”
“In November 2020, the Big Park Regional Coordinating Council, in keeping with its bylaws, formed a committee to define our village’s sense of place and identity, precedent to delivery of content requested by Yavapai County for its Comprehensive Plan update,” Camille Cox, president and Community Plan Committee chairwoman for the Big Park Regional Coordinating Council, wrote in a press release. “A primary task of the committee will be to conduct a community-wide survey to learn the sentiments and values of our residents and business owners.”
Williams also stressed that residents of smaller unincorporated communities should also make sure to contact the county directly. The county is setting up a website at planningyavapai2032.org, which Williams said is still under construction, but will allow county residents to sign up for updates on the process. In addition to the surveys being put out by the various local communities, the county is putting out its own survey to get information.
Community groups encouraged their residents to contact them directly if they are interested in getting involved in their groups’ process — those in the Beaver Creek area by emailing Contact@ BeaverCreekAZ.us, Cornville residents by contacting ccadirector3@gmail.com, and VOC residents by emailing Info@bigparkcouncil.org.
At their meeting on Feb. 17, the Yavapai County Board of Supervisors were set to approve a 10-member advisory board for the process. In addition to two members each of the Board of Supervisors and the county Planning & Zoning Commission, the board will include a separate representative for each of the county’s five districts, and one remaining seat [not yet determined] for an interested outside agency. Mary Chicoine and John Black have been nominated to be the representatives for Districts 2 and 3, respectively.
“A good plan is the guarantee of a healthy future for our county,” said District 3 Supervisor Donna Michaels, who is one of the two BOS members who may be on the committee, along with District 1 Supervisor Henry Oberg. “We’re all living the consequences of whether there’s good planning or not, or planning that’s done its best to meet how we live now. If we don’t get this right, we aren’t going to have the kind of county and communities that we came here for …. We better be good listeners — accurate listeners, not just good listeners.”
