Land Use

NACo provides land use planning assistance to counties through specialized technical assistance and training, such as the Western Community Stewardship Forum, and publications, including the "Planning for Results Guidebook." To help county officials' specifically interested in tools and techniques to protect farm and ranch lands as well as other open space, NACo is working with the American Farmland Trust, Trust for Public Land and other national non-profit groups.

For more information on NACo's land use programs, please contact James Davenport at (202) 661-8807 jdavenpo@naco.org

07/16/2007 - Intergovernmental Planning For Economic Development/ Lake County, Ill.
Presented at the County Leadership For Regional Collaboration And Intergovernmental Planning workshop held during the NACo 2007 NACo Annual Conference

07/16/2007 - Intergovernmental Agreements/Pierce County, Wash. Example
Presented at the County Leadership for Regional Collaboration and Intergovernmental Planning workshop held during the NACo 2007 Annual Conference

07/16/2007 - Regional Collaboration: An Oregon Model that Works
Presented at the County Leadership for Regional Collaboration and Intergovernmental Planning workshop held during the NACo 2007 Annual Conference

06/09/2009 - NACo Wildfire Clearinghouse
Launched in 2008, the NACo Building County Capacity to Reduce Wildland Fire Risk in the Wildland-Urban Interface (WUI) project provides county officials and planners with technical assistance, training, and tools to build their capacity to proactively reduce wildland fire risk and associated costs in the WUI. Through this project, NACo will serve as the catalyst to build county capacity to develop and implement land use policies and regulations that reduce wildland fire risk in the WUI and initiate increased collaborative planning and resource management between county, state, federal, tribal and community (elected, planning and fire service) officials.

01/08/2009 - Coastal Counties Restoration Initiative
Information on NACo's Coastal Counties Restoration Initiative Grant Program

08/05/2008 - Building County Capacity to Reduce Wildland Fire Risk in the Wildland-Urban Interface
Project provides county officials with technical assistance, training, and tools to build their capacity to proactively reduce wildland fire risk and contain associated costs in the wildland urban interface (WUI). Also will assess the current status of county development and implementation of Community Wildfire Protection Plans (CWPPs) in addition to county implementation of best practices in land use planning and policies, zoning ordinance development, building and development and code standards, specifically focusing on communities at-risk, and conduct education and outreach activities to county officials nationwide.

05/21/2007 - Encouraging Compatible Land Use Between Local Governments and Military Installations (PDF format)
This best practices guide focuses on approaches that military installations and their surrounding communities can implement to initiate land use compatibility.

12/04/2006 - Collaborative Land Use Planning: A Guide for Military Installations and Local Governments
This guide should help increase county and city officials' understanding of the potential effects their land use decisions may have on military installation operations.

12/04/2006 - Working with Local Governments: A Practical Guide for Installations
This guide is designed to help Dept. of Defense officials and military installation commanders gain a better understanding of how state and local governments make land use decisions that may affect military operations.

09/27/2006 - Cooperating Across Boundaries: Partnerships to Conserve Open Space in Rural America
This USDA Forest Service publication offers examples of partnership techniques used to perserve open space in rural America. Several county case studies are included.

03/31/2004 - Community Wildfire Protection Plan Handbook
The handbook offers a detailed description of how to create a community wildfire protection plan as allowed by the Healthy Forests Restoration Act of 2003 (HFRA). It is a step-by-step guide for local communities in wildfire prone areas to better prepare and reduce the future risks of catastrophic wildfires.

03/26/2007 - Counties honored for land conservation efforts at NACo conference
Pitkin County, Colo., Sonoma County, Calif., and Lake County, Ill. were honored as winners of the third annual County Leadership in Conservation Awards at NACo’s 2007 Legislative Conference.

11/27/2006 - Voters approve record funding for land conservation
In the Nov. 7 election, voters in 23 states approved 99 ballot measures to increase state and local government funding for land conservation, for a total of $5.73 billion.