DELAYING VOTE ON COUNTY PLANNING WILL MEAN MORE VOTERS HAVE A SAY IN THE FINAL OUTCOME

The Cape Girardeau County Commission's decision to delay until November a vote on countywide planning and zoning was a wise one for two reasons:

It gives voters more time to learn about the proposal, and it assures a greater number of voters will go the polls to decide the issue

The proposal had been put on the April 4 ballot for municipal and school board elections. Fewer voters go the polls in April compared to the number in a November presidential election. That way, the outcome should be viewed by the County Commission as a truer indication of whether county residents want planning and zoning.

Voters will decide in November whether they want county planning, and the commission has already made it clear that if planning is approved it will pass an ordinance enacting zoning. The commission knows now, after further legal research, that it can adopt a zoning ordinance without voter approval.

The commission apparently wasn't sure about the procedure when it decided to put the question to a countywide vote in April. Now that county officials have done their homework, voters should do the same.