Preston council forwards water and transportation priorities to Planning & Zoning

Preston — The City Council moved to forward staff-written priorities for the comprehensive plan to the Planning & Zoning Commission, directing PNZ to draft updated language for the water (Element 6) and transportation (Element 3) sections.

Councilmembers agreed to replace the term "secondary municipal water source" with "additional municipal water source" to better reflect drinking-water needs and emergency redundancy. Staff reported discussing options with the Idaho Department of Water Resources and said a realistic path could include acquiring agricultural water rights and evaluating their conversion to municipal consumptive use. "The council recognizes that Preston's reliance on a single municipal water source presents a long-term vulnerability," the staff memo states.

On transportation, staff highlighted three priority safety locations identified during field reviews with Keller and the Idaho Department of Transportation: the six-way intersection near Poppin' Pens, the junior-high school crossing, and the Burger King intersection. Traffic volumes were described in the memo as averaging about 9,000 vehicles per day at a cited corridor with significant seasonal variation.

Council voted to send the memorandum to Planning & Zoning, asked staff to record meeting dates of prior DOT consultations for the record, and requested that PNZ hold public hearings as part of the comprehensive-plan update process.

Next steps

Planning & Zoning will draft revised language, schedule public meetings, and return recommendations to the council as part of the formal comprehensive-plan amendment process.