Todd County Fiscal Court moved unanimously Friday morning to begin implementation of countywide planning and zoning.
County Attorney Jeff Traughber says with Friday’s vote, the county must now go about having a ‘comprehensive plan’ drafted while he approaches the cities of Elkton, Guthrie and Trenton about whether they want to be part of a city-county ‘joint planning body’ that would enforce and interpret each of their respective ordinances.
Todd County Judge-Executive Todd Mansfield is in favor of countywide zoning, saying they currently have no tools to stop any type of development from moving into any location outside of the city limits, no matter how unwelcome that development may be to nearby residents and landowners.
Judge Mansfield sees it more as protecting Todd County’s way of life than being restrictive of what landowners can do with their own property.
He acknowledges countywide zoning would have been unpopular several years ago, but believes feelings are changing.
Traughber says it can take up to a year to fully implement countywide zoning and Friday’s vote was just the approval for him to begin the first steps.
In other news from the meeting, Frances Henderson from Pennyrile Electric says 1,100 Todd County homes and businesses have signed up for HES Energy Net as the expansion of fiber service continues and they hope to have much of south Todd with the ability to hook up by the end of this year. It may be the spring to early summer of next year before most of northern Todd County can sign up.
Timothy Griffey and Richard Shaw were also on hand from HES and Griffey says they’ve seen a very good response, with many residents calling to sign up as soon as they see the lines going up.