land use

The agenda for Tuesday night's meeting of the Orange Park Town Council has one interesting, and potentially far-reaching issue, cloaked in the innocuous title of:

Public Hearing and Second Reading of an Ordinance creating a new permissable use by exception for "facilities for assistance to the needy" in the "Residential, General" zoning district.

On the surface, the request for a land use change sounds nice, even commendable. Waste Not, Want Not, an organization that collects food from grocery stores and then redistributes it to other groups, has asked for an exception to the town's zoning law to allow it to set up in an area designated for general residential use. Who doesn't support getting leftover groceries into the hands of hungry people throughout Northeast Florida? To say no to such a request by a "facility for assistance to the needy" must sound uncaring.