While it sounds generic and wide ranging, a compre-hensive plan is a serious document. Creating this plan is an opportunity for the public, planning experts and elected officials to come together and develop a vision for a community. It’s a document that can take many forms; have a wide variety of people involved; can take months or years to complete; and is often an expensive undertaking.
The comprehensive plan will become the basis of your locality's zoning ordinance since it covers a variety of important base data; considers critical and sometimes hidden issues in your community; and provides a basis for weighing all these facts, visions and views into a community’s defined policies for the future.
Our Westchester 2025 tool, Planning Base Studies, offers municipalities a tremendous, Web-based resource of much of the base data, maps, charts and analysis for a building comprehensive plan.
Find out about the status of comprehensive plans in each of the county’s 43 municipalities as of July 2022.
If you're interested in learning in greater detail what would be included in a comprehensive plan, whether you are considering a new or updated one, the topics below will provide additional guidance. It is especially important to understand what New York State legally requires before you start the planning process.