Once the Hamilton County board has adopted and published the ordinance that sets up a level B system and the procedures for adding roads to it, the hearing process can begin. One public hearing will be held for all the class B reclassifications. Registered letters will be sent to surrounding landowners notifying them of the proposed road vacations, and then public hearings will be held for each proposed vacation. Hearings will be conducted this summer and early fall. Konrady says that one trade-off the county is making by eliminating mileage from the road system is that the county is also limiting its needs, albeit slightly, for the next Iowa DOT needs study.
Research alleviates political pressure.
As one of a handful of Iowa counties expecting to grow significantly in the next 20 years, Johnson County is struggling with issues of land use, development, and the impact on the county's roads. The residential zoning causes property owners and land speculators to have certain expectations, Davidson says, such as having safe public roads. The studies, which are snapshots in time, compared the cost of public services for commercial, agricultural, and residential uses in states all across the country, including Minnesota and Wisconsin. In unincorporated areas, for every dollar of tax revenue generated by commercial or agricultural land uses, 25-75 cents worth of services were needed. Either option puts board members in a difficult political situation.