By Janine DavisRecord Staff WriterMarthasville is poised to adopt a comprehensive plan — its first-ever in the city’s 200-year history.The sweeping plan was unveiled and explained at a public hearing at city hall last Wednesday, Officials said there were no objections raised at the meeting.“Every business and family needs a plan of some sort to help make good decisions and help manage and plan for the future, and that’s what our city plan does,” said Mayor Jason Schantz during the hearing.At the heart of the plan is finding ways to effectively manage the city’s needs as Marthasville continues to grow, said Schantz, noting its population has tripled over the past 20 years.“We’ve absorbed that growth, but now it’s apparent the city and citizens should have some measure of say in how this growth is managed going forward, and put our community at the center of shaping change that’s to come,” he said. “We’re all in agreement that we needed guidelines and input for how to invest and develop in a way that respects the will of the people and the fabric of the community.” Schantz told attendees that the process for the plan included two years of discussion and public input from citizens that a comprehensive plan committee and Boonslick Regional Planning Commission, which oversaw the project, compiled. As part of the process, citizens were surveyed about their views pertaining to city needs.“The comprehensive plan is really a blueprint or road map — and a very flexible one — that gives guidelines to city leaders on where citizens would like to see city funds invested,” Schantz said. “Do we want more parks or fewer parks? What types of businesses do citizens want the city to attract and retain? What bridges do we need to fix in the next two to five years? What types of facilities or equipment will we need? So that instead of being reactive every time there’s a crisis and having to spend money in crisis mode, we can be looking ahead and spending more wisely.” Schantz said having a plan gives more direction to the aldermen when they’re doing the annual budget as a point of reference on the importance citizens place on various types of capital spending and other projects. “We’ve been missing citizen input on the budget,” he commented. “With a plan and input from citizens, we can prioritize programs and projects based on the direct input of our community. We spent two years asking our citizens ‘What do you want?’ This plan is simply a reflection of what we got from people in our city.”Leaders said they were committed to having a diverse set of viewpoints represented in planning, creating a committee composed of people from different age groups, backgrounds and length of residency to yield a wide variety of perspectives. Eighteen people originally were on the committee, which ended up at 16 members at the conclusion of the process. The comprehensive plan is expected to be adopted by aldermen at a future meeting.

What the plan coversThe plan covers a lot of territory, from an audit of past and future growth trends, demographic profiles, and a look at the current labor force to anticipate housing and infrastructure needs. In its introduction, the plan document states that it is “a framework for important decisions in the community such as where growth should occur, how land should be used and where spending priorities should be placed for the next 10 to 20 years. Comprehensive plans are general in nature but provide the legal basis for key land management tools like zoning and subdivision regulations.”A key element of the plan is its land use section which specifies the uses of various types of property. Although Marthasville currently doesn’t have land use regulations, the committee members recognized the need to have regulations in place to understand how land should be used in the future. A “future expansion map” shows Marthasville’s general vision for future growth and development within the city.

Zoning and building codesSchantz was quick to point out that the plan is not about zoning ordinances or building codes that mandate this or that.“That’s a separate thing that’s not part of this plan,” he said. “If and when the city gets to the point of using tools like building permits or zoning, I can assure you it’s going to be done in a very light-handed and general approach strictly to mitigate land conflict; not to tell people what they can do or what colors they can paint their gutters. This is Marthasville; not a gated community.“Do you want to have an adult entertainment place next to a school or church? Do you want to have a rendering plant near a housing development? Right now, the city has no say, and zoning helps control that.”If zoning becomes necessary in the future, the mayor said, it will be something that citizens will be highly involved in.“There would be 12-15 opportunities to be involved in the process before it ever happens,” Schantz said.

‘Velvet glove’“If you look at the plan, you get a sense of the velvet glove versus leather boot approach we took just by the size of the document alone,” said Schantz. “Some plans go into hundreds of pages with full-color photos and illustrations of acceptable types of street lighting, for example. Ours is 69 pages, so there’s not a lot of room there to tell people what they can and can’t do.” Committee member Becky Adams echoed that sentiment. “I felt that most people involved were wanting to make sure it wasn’t super-super strict,” she said. “We didn’t want to get down to telling people what colors they could paint their house, and we won’t.” 

More control over developmentsAt the same time, Schantz said one of the outcomes of the plan would be that the city will have more control — where there has been none — as developers build subdivisions and other properties. “The city has inherited some persistent problems from prior developments over which it’s had absolutely no control,” said Schantz. “As a result, when residents in those developments who are dealing with problems come to the city for help — the city’s had no control over the area being developed and no control over quality or infrastructure — so we’ve been in the position of telling residents, ‘We’re really sorry, but that’s not a city street or sewer.’ Their infrastructure was developed with no input from the city. And the homeowner is stuck. We don’t want those problems to persist.“Hopefully we can work with developers as the city grows, so that things are done right from the beginning and avoid headaches later on.”Marthasville closer to adopting growth plan