WENDELL - After months of dry policy-making, the town is nearing passage of rules that would help guide the town's growth for the next 10 years.

The town's planning board cleared the way for town commissioners to make the final decision on the town's new unified development ordinance, or UDO.

The 400-page document includes rules for where certain kinds of development can occur, and under what rules. It also creates regulations that outlaw development in flood plains and dictates architectural guidelines, such as limiting the use of vinyl as a siding material for new buildings.

Planning board members ploughed through a host of issues at their meeting Monday night, following up on concerns expressed by town officials and the public in a series of public input sessions.

Among the key recommendations of the planning board is to do away with a rule that would limit when plannning board members who live outside the town limits could vote on business before the board.

Language in the proposed ordinance would not allow planning board members who live in the town's planning jurisdiction, but outside the town's corporate limits to vote on matters that involve property inside the town's borders.

Planning board members voted to recommend that commissioners strike that language.

The planning board also voted to recommend language that would require churches to be approved only with special use permits. Such a permit allows the town to dictate guidelines specific to the development they are being asked to OK.

The rules would also limit property owners to no more than two accessory buildings on property with those buildings being no larger than half the size of the home on the property.

The rules would still allow developers to pay fees in lieu of constructing certain amenities like sidewalks and open space. Under existing rules, that fee is paid at the time the developer first seeks approval for the development. But the new rules propose delaying that payment until the developer's final plans are approved. Sometimes the length of time between the first and final approval can be as much as five years. By delaying the payment, staffers said the town could realize larger payments because the value of the property, which dictates how much is paid in fees, could rise significantly.

Planning board members recommended keeping the town's current policy in place out of concern that initial development plans don't always come to fruition and the town would risk losing that payment.

Town commissioners were scheduled to hear the last public comments on the document at Monday night's town board meeting. They will consider final approval of the document at a future meeting.