Clark residents have come out with more force than residents in just about any other planning area during the rounds of public comment regarding Development Standards and Regulations, and that was the case again recently. 

“We received a very large amount of input from Clark,” Park County Planning Director Joy Hill said. 

In short, many Clark residents don’t want change. Clark resident Allie Hall said residents gathered on Father's Day at Edelweiss to review the proposed DSR Draft and submit feedback before the June 22 deadline. 

“I'm so proud of my neighbors for rallying around an issue that matters to us, especially with such short notice and on a holiday,” she said. 

In all, 73 community members — a sizeable percentage of the area population of roughly 400 full-time residents  — participated in the get-together and then sent in 73 feedback forms with a few strongly held positions: 95.9% strongly disagreed with reducing minimum lot sizes in the Clark area; 89% strongly disagreed with the proposed location and scope of the limited commercial zones suggested on the latest draft zoning map; and 89% recommended rejecting the proposed zoning changes. 

In large part, county leaders listened. 

In the wake of the latest public comment meeting in the northern Park County community, Park County commissioners, planning and zoning board members and planning staff focused on Clark first during a meeting Tuesday morning to hash out what changes needed to be made in the latest proposed zoning map covering the area. 

Commissioner Dossie Overfield said the main themes in the comments received from Clark — other residents who weren't at the Sunday event also commented — are: they don’t want commercially zoned land (they’re fine with Edelweiss); many don’t like the ability of lot size averaging (if a subdivision has a 20-acre minimum lot size, some lots could be significantly smaller); and a good portion simply don’t want any change. 

Hill said the zoning map isn’t much different from before, although after early public comments, changes from the technical advisory group, planning and zoning members and commissioners, some areas of General Rural 35 Acre that have already been subdivided were changed to a smaller zoning area such as 10 or 20 acres, and a small amount of commercial was included near the community center and Edelweiss. 

But in the end, the groups Tuesday morning agreed to, for the most part, simply keep Clark zoning as it’s been, which is largely GR35 or GR20, in the next draft, while keeping a few new commercial areas (Clark currently has no commercial zoning) where landowners had not asked to be excluded from commercial zoning. 

“Let’s go back to the old map,” commissioner and Clark resident Lloyd Thiel said, adding, “I don't have a problem going back. What I’m mostly hearing is no change, so if we go back to what it was, it’s not going to change everything.”

A number of comments expressed frustration at previous subdivisions of larger tracts and a desire to prevent that happening again. 

Hill said many of the areas with 10-20 acre parcels would not be able to subdivide anymore if kept in GR20, which seems to be in large part the consensus of Clark residents. 

She said lot size averaging has confused people for years, but while a property owner could have a much smaller lot in GR20, that’s only if they are breaking smaller lots off from a much larger parcel to maintain a 20 acre average. In other words, unless you have 40 acres or more, you can’t subdivide in GR20. 

Hill said the new regulations will include more information to explain lot size averaging. 

Over an hour, the groups settled on reverting to larger acreages in many of the areas that had been zoned smaller, such as GR10, in the latest map.

A couple of Clarkites present seemed to be satisfied with the zoning changes as they, in essence, prevent further subdividing in many of the areas. 

While the changes are only to update the latest draft maps and are not yet finalized, the county boards are already scheduling what could be the final meetings to hash out the regulations, maps and use tables prior to publishing a proposed adoption draft later this summer ahead of a planning and zoning vote. If approved, the regulation amendments will then be published again for a period of time before the Park County commissioners vote. Hill and others have expressed numerous times the hope to gather as much public comment as possible before the process is expected to wrap up by the end of the year. 

“Sunday turned into an unexpected social opportunity for us (neighbors) to connect and visit with one another; it was a delightful afternoon,” Hall said. “Overall, we're hopeful that the county will make meaningful changes to the new zoning proposal that are in alignment with the response from their Clark constituency.”