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James Cowhey: Our comprehensive plan is called "Envision
Lancaster County" and it's really a comprehensive comprehensive plan. It is made up of several
elements. The primary elements of our plan are the policy plan called "RE visions," which
really sets out the vision or the aspirations that this community has for the future. The
main component of our plan is our -- is called "Balance." That's our growth management plan,
and that's where we lay out the future land use for Lancaster County. And then a big part
of this plan is to form partnerships with the rest of the community from the county level.
Ralph Goodno: We've been working with the county for 40
years. We -- our organization alone owns and manages 27 nature preserves. All the lands
that we protect are open for the public use. That's different than what goes on with farmland
preservation, which is basically, you know, removing development rights from the land
so that the farmers and owners can continue to farm.
Luke Brubaker: The Lancaster County commissioners have been
very instrumental over the past years of being very supportive of a county and state preservation
program to preserve the land. The county is doing a great job now of holding the line
with their growth management in keeping development where it should be, and that's making our
county what it is today.
Wendy Nagle: When we look especially at Lancaster County,
we know how important the rural areas are, and especially the farmlands. If you interview
our visitors, you interview our residents, everybody says the same things: those pristine
farmlands are such an important part of who we are, our history, why people come to see
us, and also the economic impact of agriculture overall is so important, and certainly supportive
of the lifestyle of the Mennonite and Amish communities, which are so much a part of Lancaster
County. The demographics are changing, and we're seeing new people and new people groups
coming in, and new waves of immigration, but we're still seeing opportunities to connect
and get to know each other, and that's incredibly important.
Ed Goodheart: This concept of smart growth, it preserves
prime farmland and it preserves the quality of life that's, you know, been, been great. Our
location is such -- people from New York, and New Jersey, and D.C., they come and visit
here and think, "Wow, what a great place. I'm going to retire here." Well, that's all right,
but you know, just stay in the urban growth areas. And we have a pretty good balance
now of making that work.
James Cowhey: Unfortunately, people assume that density
simply means, I guess, sort of piling people in one place. And really what we're
talking about is quality designed, new communities, or retrofitting our existing communities so
that we're not putting pressure to expand the growth areas into the agricultural areas.
Dan Zimmerman: This project here at Newport Square is
a great example. It was zoned for high density, and it would have been a tremendous impact
on the school district. We met with the developer, we met with the school district and said you
know what? What if we did part of this as an apartment complex, and we give the developer
credit for creating as many one and two bedroom apartments as possible. This particular developer
created a large amount of repairing buffers, donated over 15 acres of wetlands for preservation
by the township, created over 12 acres of recreational land, they're making necessary
street connections, they thought about the impact on the school district, they mitigated
some of that. Look at all the environmental improvements they're going to make out of
this project. At the end of this project, we had no negative comments. People sort of
said, "Yeah, the benefits outweigh the negatives." It was an area that was destined for growth,
so in essence it's going to be a good, balanced approach, and it's going to provide permanency
to the community.
James Cowhey: The whole idea of smart growth development
of communities, if we get back to the idea of walkability and the integration of mixed-use
so that we're reducing the need for automobile trips. We're encouraging the -- as much as
possible the integration of communities along the existing transit routes, and, you know,
just making sure that we're coordinating land use with the existing system and the future
transportation system.
Ralph Goodno: There is a history in Lancaster County of
people caring about the land and the landscape. And so people pick up on this stuff, on, you
know, on information about development, or information on land protection, or good
successes in planning and that sort of thing. They pick up on it, and they get it. And that's
one of the reasons that I came here, because I had a sense that that was the case, and it is.