The City of Chicago Committee on Zoning will hold a special hearing on May 17 to review the final draft text of the City's new zoning code. The Committee is expected to take one last round of public comment on the proposed code and then transmit it to City Council for its approval in late May.
After four long years, the Mayor’s Zoning Reform Commission has completed the
draft text of Chicago’s new zoning ordinance. The draft text will be brought
before a Special Hearing of the Committee on Zoning for its approval on May 17,
2004 at 10 a.m. in City Council Chambers at 121 N. LaSalle Street.
As MPC urged in its March 6, 2003 testimony, the Committee will entertain one
last round of public comment on the draft text in its entirety (For MPC’s
testimony on the public comment period, click here.) This represents the final opportunity for the public to
comment on the ordinance before the Committee passes it on to the full City
Council, which is expected to adopt the ordinance at its May
26, 2004 meeting.
Residents and community groups can offer testimony in writing and in person
at the May 17 committee hearing or submit written testimony via the Mayor’s Zoning
Reform Commission’s Web site, which also includes the full draft text of the
ordinance.
The
new zoning ordinance will spell out rules and regulations for
developments like this new building in Chicago's West
Town community. Zoning
dictates the type, size, location, and character of development
projects.
Once the City Council adopts
the text, however, the zoning reform process is far from over...
While the new rules for development will be officially
adopted on paper, the City will still need to update official zoning maps
showing where new rules apply. A preliminary conversion chart, which will take
effect six months after the ordinance passes, will partially guide the mapping
process. The task of addressing any larger community zoning issues will then
fall to each individual alderman, with help from the Department of Planning and
Development. MPC urges residents and community groups to gather information
about zoning issues in their neighborhoods and work with their aldermen to
ensure that their issues are addressed during the mapping process. MPC created
the Zoning Change Strategy
to
help communities prepare for the mapping process. MPC will prepare a package for
community groups to conduct the strategy on their own in the coming weeks on
this Web site.
For more background information on MPC's
Zoning Change Strategy , click
here.