KOOTENAI: Say no to zoning code

As a child, my family lived on a farm. My grandparents lived on the same farm, so we would often walk to visit them. My wife was also raised on a farm. Her uncle lived in a separate house and their extended family dined together. These were good times, not bad ones. The Unified Land Use Code proposed for Kootenai County will no longer allow for this arrangement on most rural properties. Some may think this lifestyle is no longer important. Perhaps that is true in some of our more urban neighborhoods, but family values and close family associations are still alive and well here in the country. I can think of at least 12 neighbors with two houses on their properties, typically for family members. Children come back home. Retirees return from the city.

By increasing the present minimum site area from five acres to the proposed 40 acres, and then requiring that roads be subtracted in the area calculation, the proposed code will require more than 100 acres to be owned in most cases just to add a house for Grandma. That is not right and it needs to be changed. The county commissioners should reduce the minimum site area for both of the “Working Lands” classifications to 20 acres, or less. And “gross” acres rather than “net” acres should be used in the calculation. The code should not be allowed to take this important lifestyle away from the next generation.

JOHN T. McFADDIN

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