Routt County Climate Action Plan Collaborative: New development code a win for habitat and climate

As our community becomes increasingly built up, decisions about how best to protect our wildlife, water and open space are becoming more and more common. How we manage and use the land around us in Routt County can have a big impact on how we respond to the challenge of climate change.

In June, Routt County commissioners adopted a new unified development code designed to help protect sensitive habitats and other important resources from future expansion.

The new ordinance sets rules and regulations for building in certain areas of the county, covering a wide range of issues from where denser development can occur to how new construction must be landscaped. Some of the natural features protected in the new ordinance, such as riparian areas and wetlands, are the county’s most carbon-rich ecosystems, and protecting them is key to maintaining ecosystem services, including the important role they play in removing carbon from the atmosphere.

The new code is consistent with previous goals the county set in 2021 to reduce carbon emissions as part of the Routt County Climate Action Plan. While most local climate plans at the time did not include land use recommendations, Routt County local governments recognized their importance and included several land use actions in the plan.

Recently, the Climate Action Plan Collaborative’s official land use working group released several recommendations prioritizing actions that local governments and partners could take to conserve and restore natural habitats to store carbon and increase resilience. The new Unified Development Code incorporates many of these recommendations.

One of the key provisions of the new UDC is to require greater setbacks from rivers, streams and wetlands for all new construction. This will not only help protect the trees and wildlife habitat in our riparian corridors, but will also improve water quality and sequester carbon.

Several sections of the UDC provide the Ministry of Planning with tools to maximize the protection of native vegetation. One of the most important provisions is the instruction that new construction “shall preserve as much of the natural vegetation as possible.”

In addition, the inclusion of open space conservation measures, particularly as a public good in the context of planned residential developments, will help protect native vegetation. Perhaps most importantly, the UDC’s critical wildlife habitat provisions will result in the maintenance or mitigation of impacts on natural vegetation. These measures should prevent large-scale forest clearance or the conversion of large areas of native bushland to grassland, and help maintain existing soil carbon stocks in naturally vegetated areas.

Several provisions will also reduce water use in outdoor landscaping, including limiting the installation of turf, directing the use of native plants in landscaping, emphasizing low water use principles in landscaping, and requiring efficient irrigation systems when incorporated.

The new UDC also includes improvements to the process for designating land conservation parcels, an important tool for protecting against habitat fragmentation and preserving additional natural areas that should be encouraged when planning new developments.

Combined with previously passed legislation that established a process to avoid destruction of natural habitat when siting new commercial-scale solar facilities, the new UDC will help protect the natural areas in Routt County that we all value as residents and that help store carbon in our soils and vegetation.

Written by Tim Sullivan, Resilient Land and Water Director of the Yampa Valley Sustainability Council on behalf of the Routt County Climate Action Collaborative. For more information, visit RouttClimateAction.com.