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A committee formed to review Garrett Park's zoning laws and assess whether they remain relevant to the desires of residents will hold its first meeting in early February, having received its charge from the Town Council on Jan. 12.

Gene Brantly, chairman of the Garrett Park Land Use Task Force, said he requested specific guidance from the council on what the task force should review to better focus the group's efforts.

The task force charge suggests the group analyze the town's zoning from a context of Garrett Park's history, attempting to gain an understanding of what elements of the town create the "unique, special character" that draws people to it. The group is then asked to define ways to maintain that character while accommodating change over the next 20 years.

Specific suggestions in the charge include analyzing whether Garrett Park's open space laws, which dictate how much undeveloped space a lot must have and have been the center of controversy in recent ordinance disputes, should be changed, as well as whether the town should adopt green zoning policies such as pervious surface requirements. The task force has also been asked to assess how the town's regulatory and review processes could be improved, and what tools, incentives and regulations would be useful in achieving the new zoning vision.

Brantly said he was "pleased" with the charge.

"I think the council really wants us to take a look at the long term," Brantly said. "They gave us a broad charge on purpose."

Mayor Chris Keller has said in the past that he wanted the task force to largely set its own agenda, but devised a change upon Brantly's request.

Kevin Pope, a member of the 23-member task force, said he thinks the group will serve mostly as an "information gathering body," which will include studying how other similar communities handle zoning and make recommendations to the council regarding what would work best in Garrett Park.

But Phil Schulp, another task force member, is dissatisfied with the charge, which he said "just looks like a bunch of surveys" regarding what people like about the town and what other communities have done, a task he said the town would be better served to hire out.

"I had envisioned actually sitting down and working out whether or not we even have to have the town do something with zoning or have the county do it and then look at what the recommendation will be," Schulp said.

Whether the town should adopt additional ordinances under powers granted to it by the state in 2006 is listed as one of the issues to be addressed in the charge.

Brantly said he expects the process to take at least a year, but because it may be desirable to craft new ordinances from the recommendations that may go up for a vote by the town, he is aiming to finish before the town election in May 2010.

Brantly said the first meeting, which has not yet been set, will primarily focus on how the future meetings will run and establishing bylaws and subcommittees. All Land Use Task Force meetings will be public and subject to open meeting laws.