Community Input & Review

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The Farmton Plan was developed through stakeholder collaboration, the purpose of which to engage individuals representing a broad range of interests – environmental, government, civic, economic, agricultural, recreational and other interests– and invite them to help create that vision and plan for Farmton.

Participants included representatives from state and local government, businesses and environmental groups, and interested citizens.  The majority of ideas generated from these workshops were incorporated into the Plan.  In addition, the greenprint itself was vetted with The Nature Conservancy, Audubon of Florida, Volusia Forever, and Brevard Environmental and Endangered Lands. 

Customized Planning for Each County

While Brevard and Volusia may be adjacent counties of similar size, there are two different planning contexts.  Volusia has completed its Evaluation and Appraisal Report (EAR) based amendments and has adopted its award winning Smart Growth Amendment which protection of a 300,000 acre area known as the Environmental Core Overlay (ECO). The Farmton Plan adds 13,000 acres to ECO.

In Brevard County, the Farmton Plan was submitted together with the county's EAR based amendments.  It has provisions in its plan for both "private conservation," transfer of development rights, and "new towns."  Both counties have strong and progressive environmental acquisition programs.  Volusia has a charter requirement for school planning while Brevard requires school concurrency at the development stage.  The Farmton Plan has attempted to meet the requirements of the individual counties.

The comprehensive plan amendments were filed in early 2009.  On June 1-2, 2009, a Peer Review Panel was convened by Florida Atlantic University and co-chaired by Jim Murley and Steve Siebert and included a number of national experts on conservation development and greenprinting.   They produced a report and the recommendations of the report have been included in the plan.

Download documents from the Stakeholder Meetings and Peer Review Panel:

Additional Reviews

The greenprint has been through two additional reviews for input from environmental peers.  On July 1, 2010 the East Central Florida Regional Planning Council (ECFRPC) convened a number of stakeholders including environmental resource agencies and representatives from Audubon and The Nature Conservation.  In August 2010 the plan was reviewed by the GeoPlan Center at University of Florida.  Additional changes to the greenprint were made at that meeting to increase the conservation area.

As a result of staff reviews, the Peer Reviews, and Greenprint Reviews, the Farmton Plan has been through over 35 revisions. While this level of input is rarely attempted by a landowner because of its complexity, it is part of Farmton’s commitment to include the experts and scholars from the local community, as well those who are nationally renowned.

 

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