Amador County - Amador County supervisors and planning commissioners reworked the county draft General Plan Wednesday, adding an economic development element and also a Mineral Resource Production designation. County Planner Susan Grijalva reminded of public input on optional elements, including agriculture, economic development, water, rural character and design, historic preservation, sustainability and governance. Supervisor Louis Boitano said he liked an economic development element with agriculture falling under it. Planning Commissioner Andy Byrne said he thought “water will be very important in the next 30 years.” Grijalva said having various areas of focus in the economic development element would serve as an index or “package” of guidelines for potential developers. Supervisor Ted Novelli said he thought that “just because we don’t put (water) down as an optional element doesn’t mean anyone on this board thinks it’s not important.” Grijalva said water could have its own element but it would be “popping up in other elements.”

The panel directed staff to add an economic development element with subsections on agriculture and water. The panel also added a Mineral Resource Production designation, which would not be in use yet, but would be there for future use in the Planning Department. The MRP would allow mineral processing on designated properties. The panel left in place two designations, the “Mineral Resource Zone,” for mines; and the “Industrial” designations where minerals now are being processed. Grijalva said the main inhibitor to processing minerals in certain areas was road access issues – rock trucks on small roads, such as Middle Bar, Defender Grade, Hale, Michigan Bar and others. Board Chairman Supervisor Richard Forster said he didn’t want to take away people’s ability to make money mining, where they might have 30 or 40 cows and a mining operation, to at least “have some extra income and stay in business.” Novelli agreed that heavy truck traffic was bad on the small roads and pushed for changing Industrial areas to Agriculture designations. The panel voted to remove the ag designation. The meeting adjourned to Thursday, November 20th, to meet from noon to 4 p.m. Story by Jim Reece (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.).