Project Overview
Ada County is updating its Zoning Ordinance!
Ada County is a diverse community with unique development opportunities and challenges. Ada County needs a progressive, user friendly, reorganized, and comprehensive update of its Zoning Ordinance to guide future development in a way that implements the Ada County 2025 Comprehensive Plan, properly manages development in the Area of City Impact boundaries of its six cities, and provides a framework that mitigates the impacts associated with growth and development.
Project Timeline and Documents
The Zoning Ordinance Amendment (ZOA) process will take approximately 18 months and will be separated into 3 phases. During each phase, we will engage the public, key stakeholders, County staff, and the County’s ultimate decision makers – the Planning and Zoning Commission and Board of County Commissioners. The first phase starts the update process by reviewing the County’s planning policies, comparing them to the current zoning regulations, and creating a blueprint for the new regulations. Based on that framework from phase one, phase two will be the drafting of the code with stakeholder and public review. The final phase consists of tying the code together into a complete package for formal adoption.
Maps and Resources
I still have questions – where can I find more information?
For more information, contact Stacey Yarrington at [email protected] or 208-287-7944. You can also submit general comments and questions or subscribe for e-mail updates using the form at the bottom of this page.
Public Outreach
It is crucial to Ada County Development staff that this project be a transparent and open public process. As such, we have planned a robust public engagement strategy to engage all stakeholders at each step in this process. Some of the tools we will be using include the following:
- Website and social media
- E-mail lists
- In the comment form below, you can request to be signed up for e-mail updates. We will utilize this list to notify the public of events, questionnaires, etc.
- Online questionnaires and text polling
- Due to COVID-19, we are planning online questionnaires and text polling so you can participate in this process virtually.
- See the results from our first Public Questionnaire
- Public open houses and workshops, or small forum “coffee talks”
- Open Houses were held April 20 and 21, 2022. We received mostly positive comments from the public and provided them with the following documents:What’s New – A Summary of the Draft Ordinance
Advisory Committee
Ada County established a citizen’s advisory committee to provide a sounding board for this project. The committee’s responsibilities are to:
- Review and offer feedback on the current zoning code
- Review and offer feedback on draft documents
- Provide insight and perspective of the group, organization, or community they represent
- Engage in constructive dialogue with other members of the committee
Advisory Committee Meetings
All meetings are open to the public and will follow Idaho’s Open Meetings Act. These meetings will be conducted virtually via WebEx video conferencing. While all of the Citizen’s Advisory Committee meetings will be open to the public, we will not be opening the floor to public comment during these meetings. They will be livestreamed to the Ada County YouTube account an via Facebook Live for members of the public who are interested in watching. If you would like to ask questions or share comments, you can do so on the Facebook Live. All agendas will be posted online, as well as all collateral meeting materials.
Meeting 1 – Thursday, February 18, 2021
6:00 PM
In this meeting, we will introduce the Advisory Committee and give them an overview of the Zoning Ordinance Rewrite process.
Meeting 2 – Thursday, September 16, 2021
6:00 PM
In this meeting, the advisory committee reviewed the first module of the first draft of the Ada County Zoning Ordinance Amendment rewrite, which includes the Base Zoning Districts, Overlay Districts, and the Use Table. This same presentation was made to the Planning and Zoning Commission on 9/23/2021 and to the Board of County Commissioners on 9/30/2021.
Meeting 3 – Wednesday, January 5
In this meeting, the advisory committee reviewed and discussed the Module 2 draft.
Meeting Recording (password JyMqrwf7)
Meeting 4 – Tuesday, March 8
In this meeting, the advisory committee reviewed and discussed the Module 3 draft.
Meeting Recording (password sRDa5VMJ)
Jurisdictions, Agencies, and Organizations
Throughout this process, we will be meeting with our partner jurisdictions and agencies, as well as organizations with whom we often do business with, starting with a series of Listening Sessions in Spring 2021. All meetings will be broadcast via Facebook Live, where the public is welcome to watch, ask questions, and make comments.
Wednesday, March 17, 11am-1pm
We met with the following jurisdictions: Garden City, Ada County Parks and Waterways, Land Trust of the Treasure Valley, Idaho Fish and Game, Boise School District, and Valley Regional Transit.
Notes from White & Smith LLC (Consultant on the project)
Thursday, March 18, 3-5pm
We met with the following jurisdictions: Ada Soil and Water Conservation, Boise Fire, Idaho Transportation Department, Ada County Highway District, and Idaho Power.
Notes from White & Smith LLC (Consultant on the project)
Thursday, April 1, 3-5 pm
We met with Caleb Hood from the City of Meridian, who was unable to attend the other listening sessions.
Video Recording (password to view: tPSbsqT2)
Notes from White & Smith LLC (Consultant on the project)
Tuesday, April 6, 10am-12pm
We met with the following jurisdictions: the City of Eagle, the City of Boise, and Eagle Fire.
Video Recording (password to view: ePJX3vq5)
Notes from White & Smith LLC (Consultant on the project)
Wednesday, April 7, 3-5pm
We met with Jace Hellman, Director of Kuna Planning and Zoning, as he was unable to attend the other listening sessions.
Video Recording (password to view: GjFsXhM2)
Notes from White and Smith LLC (Consultant on the project)
Thursday, April 8, 3-5pm
We met with the following organizations: Boise Valley Economic Partnership, Building Contractors Association, Urban Land Institute Idaho, Cartwright Ranch, Dry Creek Ranch, and Avimor.
Video Recording (password to view: Rxh6xcDp)
Notes from White & Smith LLC (Consultant on the project)
Tuesday, May 4, 6-8 pm
In these listening sessions, we met with Ada County Neighborhood Associations.
Meeting recording (6-7pm) Password: DmyQPCH4
Meeting recording (7-8 pm) Password: dQT9Df39
Notes from Ada County Staff (6-7pm)
Notes from Ada County Staff (7-8pm)
Tuesday, May 18, 10:30-11:30 am
In this listening session, we met with water quality experts.
Meeting recording Password: Jm7jZ4hp
Notes from White & Smith LLC
Wednesday, May 26, 4:00-5:00 pm
In this listening session, we met with water quality experts.
Meeting recording Password: zH3mC5GY
Focus Groups
One of our first steps in this process was to identify groups of people who use the Ada County Zoning Ordinance the most. Staff identified the following focus groups:
- Builders and Fire Code Officials
- Government Agencies and Service Providers
- Neighborhood Associations and Housing Authorities
- Developers
- Business/Agricultural Entities
- Planning and Zoning Commission/Board of Ada County Commissioners
As these groups are the most frequent users of the current Zoning Ordinance, and as such, the most familiar with it, we reached out to these groups first to get a better grasp on what works in the current code and what doesn’t. This will help us formulate our outreach strategy to the members of the general public who are not as familiar with the code.
You can also follow along on our social media for updates to this project!