Talks continue about zoning The Plains

• Transfer of part of The Plains from Dover Township to Athens Township; about two thirds of The Plains is located in Athens Township with the rest in Dover Township. An option suggested at the Regional Planning Commission meeting is that the township lines be redrawn so that the portion of The Plains in Dover would join the rest in Athens Township.

• Establishing a joint zoning commission. Though it’s still a hypothetical option, the Board of Trustees for each township could pass similar legislation to select zoning commission members from the Planning Commission membership to form a joint zoning commission for The Plains.

• Incorporating The Plains as a village. The currently unincorporated Plains could move toward becoming a legal village, which would eliminate jurisdiction complications when establishing zoning by creating a centralized government for the area.

• County authority to establish zoning. The Athens County Commissioners could establish one zoning commission for all of The Plains regardless of township boundaries, though it’s not likely that they will.

All appointed committee members were present at the meeting, including Logue; Patrick McGarry, an environmental health specialist with the Athens City-County Health Department; Athens County Planner Jessie Powers; Circle Hill resident Warren Jeffers, who has circulated petitions in support of zoning in the Dover Township portion of The Plains; Brian Dearing, an Athens High School teacher who has circulated petitions for zoning in the Athens Township portion of The Plains; Athens Mayor Steve Patterson; Paige Alost, executive director of the Athens County Convention and Visitors Bureau; and Athens County Engineer Jeff Maiden.

Also present at the meeting were Dover Township Trustees Chris Russell, Harold Sycks and Stuart Neal, and Athens Township Trustees Steve Pierson and Eddie Smith.

So far, the Athens Township Trustees already have passed a resolution (approved on a 2-1 vote on Aug. 28) to establish a zoning commission and are in the process of identifying potential commission members. This came after residents of The Plains in Athens Township, including Dearing, presented the Trustees at that meeting with petitions containing 146 signatures from voters in The Plains who support the idea of zoning regulations, well beyond the initially requested 78 signatures.

The Dover Township Trustees have not yet voted to do anything, though residents of The Plains in Dover Township, including Jeffers, presented their Trustees with 103 petition signatures from voters in the Circle Hill voting precinct (in The Plains) at a meeting Sept. 6. Dover Township Trustee Chris Russell said at the committee meeting on Friday that after speaking with people in the community, he believes that not many residents in Dover Township as a whole support zoning; the supporters mainly live in The Plains, which is a small portion of the township.

Millfield residents shared concerns at the meeting Sept. 6, and Russell said he had spoken with other people in The Plains community, mostly from Adena Drive and the Dresher Addition subdivision of The Plains. (Millfield is also located in Dover Township, on the other side of Chauncey from The Plains.)

“Either they were against it or said they didn’t know what they signed,” Russell said.

One major concern for Dover Township, Russell explained at the meeting, is that the funds to pay for a consultant and any other startup fees associated with establishing zoning regulations would come from the township’s general fund, which all Dover Township residents pay into through taxes.

“If we take $25,000 out of our general fund, it’s depleted,” Russell said, referring to what Athens Township Trustee Steve Pierson has estimated would be the cost each township would have to pay to hire its own consultant for zoning in The Plains. 

However, Athens Township Trustee Eddie Smith said at the meeting that he spoke with one consultant who said he “would not charge double just because The Plains happens to straddle a township line.” If the townships “work cooperatively,” Smith said he was told, they could split the cost of a single fee, perhaps based on property values.

Regional Planning Commission President Logue said that the county Prosecutor’s Office is still “looking into” the legality of establishing a joint zoning commission for all of The Plains composed of Planning Commission members, to see if that’s an option under Ohio Revised Code (ORC). “It is not clear,” Logue said.

If it does turn out to be legal, Smith said he thinks forming a joint zoning commission is the best strategy. 

Russell agreed that the joint commission option makes the most sense, “and it would help us out as well, as to not having to pay the whole $25,000 out of the general fund, but we can split it some way.”

Another option discussed at the meeting is redrawing township lines so that the Dover Township portion of The Plains would become part of Athens Township.

“I don’t think it’s a wise decision,” Russell said, affirming something Dover Township Trustee Stuart Neal has said previously.

Russell said this option could hurt Dover Township, as it would mean the loss of revenue from property taxes in that area. “You can’t say just these people that are in The Plains are the ones that are affected by this,” Russell said. “If you annex this into Athens Township, the whole township is affected.”

Jeffers said he understands that The Plains is “the cash cow” for the rest of Dover Township, but fears that township residents are “not willing to give us protections to keep that property value maintained.”

Though there are people “on both sides” of the issue, Russell said, “we’ve got to represent the majority when it comes down to it.”

Another option reviewed by the committee is the potentially costly idea of incorporating The Plains as a village, which the committee determined would not be easy, and which could also result in revenue loss for both Dover and Athens townships. It would also require a lot of political legwork, and the establishment of a new government.

“It would open the possibility of an income tax,” Smith said, “which is the number-one reason people were first cautious about signing the zoning petition.”

Jeffers, who said he has lived in The Plains for 60 years and has lived in all three voting precincts, said that bringing up the idea of incorporation in The Plains is a non-starter.

“People are stone cold against it,” Jeffers said, adding that efforts to establish zoning regulations have “stopped two other times because zoning got pushed into incorporation. We can’t afford for it to go there again.”

Logue noted that “it doesn’t happen very often that new villages are established,” and doing so would be a “heavy lift” politically.

“The hardest thing,” said Alost of the Athens County Convention and Visitors Bureau, “is that you’re trying to solve a problem that’s in front of you right now but the decision is really about what the future of an area looks like that you don’t even know the boundaries of and that you don’t even know the value of.”

The fact that The Plains is an unincorporated area makes planning difficult, the committee agreed, because “there are no real boundaries,” as county Engineer Maiden put it.

Pierson said he used a U.S. Census map of The Plains (which is considered a Census-Designated Place) to present at the Regional Planning Commission meeting last month, “which is completely different than what the (County) Auditor has, which is different than a lot of other maps.”

Jeffers added that he spoke with someone from the U.S. Post Office to see what they consider The Plains, which offered another, different set of boundaries than the maps noted above. 

Brian Dearing said he checked with the Athens County Records Center for a map outlining the Water-Sewer District in The Plains, but the clerk couldn’t provide a map. “I’m starting to lose count of how many versions of The Plains there are,” Dearing said.

THE COMMITTEE AGREED to meet again in about a month, and to return with a couple of details solidified. They include:

• Each township board of trustees agreed to come up with its own draft maps of what they consider The Plains to present to the committee for the sake of discussion.

• Each township board of trustees will bring an estimated valuation of the portion of The Plains within their respective townships.

• Hopefully answers will be provided to the various legal and financial questions that arose during the discussion.

The next meeting likely will take place at Athens High School in The Plains.