By DOTTY NIST
Walton County plans to consider revising regulations for lots in the vicinity of the coastal dune lakes that would increase flexibility in connection with clearing of vegetation on those lots.
The dune lakes are globally rare and unique bodies of water that characteristically break out into the gulf periodically.
Wayne Dyess, county planning and development services director, explained that the idea of the proposed revisions is to uphold the purpose of the Coastal Dune Lake Protection Zone (CDLPZ) in the Walton County Land Development Code (LDC) and Comprehensive Plan (CP) while providing for this flexibility.
Current regulations in the LDC and CP allow for no more than 25 percent clearing of vegetation for lots within the CDLPZ, which extends 300 feet from the dune lakes and their tributaries. The revisions as proposed would increase the allowable area for vegetative clearing to between 25 and 50 percent for lots created before the CDLPZ went into effect on Jan. 5. 1993.
The requirement for a 100-foot coastal dune lake shoreline buffer would still apply.
The proposal also states that subdivision plats clearly defining development standards would supercede the current standards. In addition, in the event of an existing nonconforming structure being destroyed by fire, storm or other event, the building would be allowed to be rebuilt in the same footprint.
While the CDLPZ regulations have been in place for decades, the vegetative clearing limits have not always been implemented or enforced as properties in the protection zone were developed.
Dyess brought the proposed revisions before the Walton County Board of County Commissioners (BCC) at its Nov. 12 meeting at the South Walton Annex to request the setting of public hearings for consideration of the revisions.
District 5 Commissioner Cindy Meadows suggested that, due to the lack of enforcement of the CDLPZ clearing regulations in the past, the allowable area for clearing of vegetation on lots in the protection zone should be increased to up to 50 percent “across the board,” not just for lots in the protection zone that were created before the CDLPZ was established. She also suggested that lot owners whose structures were destroyed be allowed to rebuild in a larger footprint as long as other requirements were met, including those pertaining to stormwater retention and buffering.
The commissioners voted to move the proposed revisions forward to public hearings, the first of which will be before the Walton County Planning Commission. More information on that hearing will be forthcoming.
