It had been nearly four years since Sedona’s City Council and Planning and Zoning Commission sat down together to talk.

That changed during a joint meeting on March 25, in which the 14 combined members discussed a variety of topics including zoning, the Community Plan as well as goals and accomplishments.

The two-hour meeting was led by Mayor Sandy Moriarty and Planning and Zoning Chairman Marty Losoff with City Attorney Mike Goimarac providing opening remarks.

“This is a great opportunity to get together and focus on the issue of planning and how you work together,” Goimarac said. “The agenda is designed to help us to have an open discussion about expectations and how to get the work done.

“There’s probably not a more controversial set of issues out there in the history of the city [than planning and zoning]. Every decision you make as a council or commission, you’re going to make someone unhappy — pretty much 99 percent of the time.”   

He said it’s crucial that council and commission members are objective when making decisions and that they avoid conflicts of interest. They also shouldn’t vote against something simply because they don’t like that type of business. He also asked if they are making their decisions because of their own feelings or are they basing them on facts, similar to a courtroom.

To read the full story, see the Wednesday, April 1, edition of the Sedona Red Rock News.