[Foodplanning] urgent advice on enabling language for urban ag. in official plans

[Joseph Nasr]

Hello to all,

I have been contacted by someone from a new group in Kingston, Ont., who
are trying to get urban ag. in their new official plan.  His names is
Andrew McCann, and his message is below.
As Andrew says, they are trying to be prepared for a Planning Committee
tonight, so any suggestions that anyone may have today would be great. 
Otherwise, this is a longer process, so suggestions after today would still
be useful to them.

Please reply directly to Andrew at mccann17 at yahoo.com.  He is not on the
FoodPlanning list.  Do cc: me, I'd be interested in what people send.  I
can compile answers and send them to this list in a few days.  I have a
feeling that others on the list will be interested in this.

Regards,
Joe

Joe Nasr
joenasr at compuserve.com
(alternates: joenasr at sympatico.ca
                  jnasr at ryerson.ca)

-----------------------------

Hi Joe,

Thank you for your ongoing support and great suggestions on the Kingston
Urban Agriculture Action Committee's (KUAAC) effort to have enabling
language for urban agriculture included in the City of Kingston's Official
Plan, now under revision.  The Planning Committee meets tonight and we are
finalizing our submission to them today.

As per our chat this morning, we are looking for examples of municipalities
in Canada, or the United States, with enabling language for urban
agriculture in their Official Plans (or whatever their top policy
statements may be called).  We are aware of many examples of cities that
support community gardens, but none that take a broad policy approach to
urban agriculture.

Furthermore, one stumbling block for the city planners we are working with
seems to be the 25% space limit placed on commercial use for residentially
zoned properties.  If people want to grow for profit in their yards are
they constrained by this regulation?  Probably, but it is uncharted
territory here.  Have other groups/municipalities run into this challenge? 
What did they do about it?

As you wisely suggested in our phone call, we can avoid the confusion
between "rural agricultural" and "urban agriculture" by proposing "urban
food production" as an alternative term.  Great idea!  I guess we might
have to change our name :)

Happy to be made aware of any last minute examples to reference in our
letter!

Thanks and until soon,
Andrew