MORGAN COUNTY
The Morgan County Board of Commissioners held a work session on May 14, the second meeting of the month.
Board members discussed various topics of concern during its nearly three-hour-long meeting.
To begin the meeting, the commissioners addressed unfinished business regarding a months-long conflict over Tax Parcel 035-047D, which was purchased by a Morgan County resident in 2024.
According to a report from Morgan County’s Planning and Development department, the resident, Richard Jeffries, purchased the parcel “not knowing it was an illegal, non-conforming lot.”
P&D ultimately denied Jeffries’ building permit, and he later spoke to the BOC at its March 3 meeting, explaining that he purchased the property to build a house and had no issues with the process until the permit was denied.
Jeffries filed an appeal to the P&D’s rejection decision at the BOC’s April 7 meeting. The report noted that Director Chuck Jarrell “expressed sympathy to Jeffries, regarding the circumstances of the property purchase” and suggested that he “seek civil legal discourse.”
During the work session, Jarrell explained that the lot is currently zoned as Agricultural Residential and therefore requires a minimum of two acres and a minimum of “300 feet of lot width and road frontage.”
Jeffries’ property reportedly consists of 1.21 acres and 182.08 feet of lot width and road frontage.
Jarrell emphasized that approving the permit could trigger a “domino effect” on other county guidelines.
Jeffries’ wife, Olivia Catarino, spoke to the commissioners during the session, noting that she has read all the commissioners’ zoning laws and understands the complicated nature of granting them a variance.
“I know that in this community, we don’t allow spot zoning, and there’s concern about the large tracts behind our property, but you still need 300 feet of road frontage,” Catarino said. “So if you’re going to sell those giant tracts, development is going to buy them because they are the only ones that have 300 feet of road frontage.”
Catarino explained to the commissioners that allowing corporations to purchase such land can lead to conflicts under existing laws.
“If they built their own road and made it into the conservatory subdivision where they keep 30% of the land, they can have smaller lots and less frontage than I have because our laws allow corporations and big companies to buy that land and put a hundred houses on it,” Catarino said. “So, I don’t think that if you change our road frontage to R3, you’re not opening the door to anyone behind us because 441 doesn’t allow that.”
The BOC unanimously agreed to deny the appeal because it included “multiple violations.”
District commissioner Ben Riden noted that he spoke to Jeffries and initially thought that the zoning required less road frontage.
“We couldn’t find a way to make it work without changing the zoning, so I was wrong in my assumption and will have to go along with the denial,” Riden said.