McComb residents are invited to be a part of the city’s ongoing process to develop a vision of growth and development for the future.
The city is holding an open house from 5 to 8 p.m. Tuesday in the conference room of McComb Sports Park, on South Magnolia Street to give the public an update on its “McComb in Motion” comprehensive plan, and residents may give their input.
Representative from the city’s zoning department, plus senior associate planner Christian Lentz of Kendig Keast Collaborative of Sugar Land, Texas, the consultants working on the plan, will be on hand.
Zoning department director Walter Temple said the gathering is informal.
“People can come and go at the meeting as they please,” he said. “... We’ll have 10 or 12 illustrations, a slide show, and there is a comprehensive plan task force reviewing draft chapters of the plan as they become available. These drafts will be at the open house for people to review.”
The city hired Kendig Keast to come up with a comprehensive plan to guide on growth and development over the next 20 years.
The firm started its research in August 2014, and Temple said they need feedback from the community to come up with a final product.
“We are hoping to see residents, property owners, business owners and anyone who is a stakeholder in the community to come and be a part of this,” Temple said.
The comprehensive plan will guide city board decisions on matters such as annexations, water and drainage, and quality-of-life enhancements like sidewalks, parks and cityscapes.
The open house will share data the firm’s research has found so far on strategies for community growth, mobility, housing, neighborhoods and economic development.
If visitors are curious about how the city might handle a sudden boon in economic development — if the prospects of the Tuscaloosa Marine Shale become prosperous — Temple said the firm has a plan for that, too.
“We have an interim ordinance in place,” he said. “It handles the proposition that the TMS brings a boon to the city. So, we had to come up with a plan to handle that sort of sudden growth and the infrastructure it would require.”
