Manchester Completes Community Engagement Meetings on Draft Zoning Ordinance with help from UNH Extension

On Saturday, September 7, the city of Manchester’s Planning and Community Development Department hosted the last of 12 public meetings to collect feedback from the communities in each ward on the first draft of a re-write of the Manchester Land Use Code. Approximately 1,100 people attended the meetings that were held over a two-and-a-half-month period. Staff initially expected attendance to average around 30 people at each meeting but were pleasantly surprised that the average attendance was 3 times higher.

The draft Land Use Code contains several incremental changes regarding development issues like minimum lot sizes, off-street parking requirements, and where to allow more housing units and neighborhood businesses. UNH Extension’s Community and Economic Development (CED) team members Scott Slattery, Rebecca Levy, Matt Marzolo and Charlie French had the privilege of assisting the city in gathering community input on these and other issues at each meeting. 

The CED team is now working on digesting and summarizing the input from each ward and will present the findings and recommendations in a report that will be presented to the Manchester Planning and Community Development Department staff and the city’s Zoning Ordinance Steering Committee this fall. The report, along with feedback from the zoning ordinance survey developed by the UNH Survey Center, will help the city incorporate concerns and needs voiced by community members into the draft Land Use Code before it is presented to the Board of Mayor and Aldermen for review.

If you would like to learn more about the community meetings, Manchester Ink Link published a series of in-depth stories on each ward meeting. Links to each article can be found here Planning Department's community tour ends with Ward 3 and a look at the proposed zoning ordinance's downtown details - Manchester Ink Link

To read the draft Land Use Code itself, view the proposed changes in the city’s zoning map, and learn about the city’s planning processes that have informed the draft, check out Land Use Code (manchesternh.gov).

There is also an informative presentation by Manchester’s Planning and Community Development Director, Jeffrey Belanger, explaining the background and impetus of the city’s Land Use Code rewriting process viewable here Manchester Public TV (castus.tv).