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Chairman Linda
W. Cropp
A PROPOSED RESOLUTION IN THE COUNCIL OF THE DISTRICT
OF COLUMBIA
To declare the sense of the Council with respect to
the need to review the process for amending the District of Columbia
Elements of the Comprehensive Plan, to review the format and content of
the Comprehensive Plan, to explore ways to make the Comprehensive Plan
more useful in providing an overall guide for the future development of
the District, to make the Comprehensive Plan more known and useful to the
citizens of the District, and to support creation of a Comprehensive
Planning Task Force to work with the Office of Planning to provide
recommendations to the Mayor and the Council about improving the
Comprehensive Plan.
RESOLVED, BY THE COUNCIL OF THE DISTRICT OF
COLUMBIA, That this resolution may be cited as the "Comprehensive
Plan Process Sense of the Council Resolution of 2002."
Sec. 2. Findings.
(a) The District Elements of the Comprehensive Plan
for the Nation's Capital ("Comprehensive Plan") were first
adopted in 1984-85 and amended in 1989, 1994, and 1998. The current
language calls for the Mayor to submit proposed legislation to amend the
Comprehensive Plan not later than March 31, 2002, and subsequently not
less frequently than once every four (4) years, ending on March 31st of
every fourth year. The Mayor has submitted proposed legislation to the
Council, the "Comprehensive Plan Amendment Act of 2002", which
revises the date for submitting Comprehensive Plan amendments from not
later than March 31, 2002, to not later than March 31, 2005. The
submission of the proposed legislation is intended to fulfill the
requirement under current law.
(b) The current amendment cycle raises two primary
issues regarding (1) the organization and benefits of the process as
currently constructed, and (2) the adequacy of the Comprehensive Plan
itself. With the major planning initiatives that have been undertaken by
the Office of Planning, the Mayor has stated that it has not been possible
to undertake the Comprehensive Plan amendment process in the current time
frame.
(c) Instead of undertaking a rushed amendment
process or simply delaying the process by a few months, the Mayor has
proposed the initiation of a thorough and inclusive review of the current
Comprehensive Plan process. The first step to implement this process would
be to establish, by Mayor's Order, a Comprehensive Planning Task Force
("Task Force"), whose members would be appointed by the Mayor
and Council Chairman to represent a broad cross section of constituencies.
This Task Force would be comprised of 25-30 members, small enough to be
efficient but still large enough to reflect a variety of interests and
geographic areas of the District and to bring varied expertise to the
discussions.
(d) The Task Force would he staffed by the Office of
Planning, which intends to contract with a consulting firm with expertise
in comprehensive planning to conduct the review and facilitate the group.
In addition, the national office of the American Planning Association
("APA") has been invited by the Office of Planning to conduct a
peer review that would bring planning directors -- who have recently
completed comprehensive planning in major cities -- to the District of
Columbia. These peers would constitute an expert panel to make
recommendations and provide advice. (e) The Mayor has stated that by
February 2003 the Office of Planning would prepare a report reflecting the
work and recommendations of the Task Force, the consultant, APA peers, and
District government staff. The report would be submitted to the Mayor and
the Council.
Sec. 3. It is the sense of the Council to concur
with the Mayor's proposal, set forth in his March 13, 2002, letter
transmitting the "Comprehensive Plan Amendment Act of 2002", to
establish a Task Force to review the process for amending the
Comprehensive Plan, and the format and general content of the
Comprehensive Plan, and to recommend improvements to the process, format,
and content. The recommendations will form the basis of a report by the
Office of Planning that will be submitted to the Mayor and the Council by
February 2003.
Sec. 4. This resolution shall take effect
immediately. |
