Teton commissioners weigh rural LDR rewrite after family-subdivision law change

Teton County commissioners on Feb. 23 considered whether to launch a formal rewrite of the county’s rural Land Development Regulations (LDRs) in response to a 2019 change to Wyoming’s family-subdivision exemption law that prevents counties from enforcing minimum lot sizes for qualifying family subdivisions. Planning staff said the change has enabled creation of very small lots inside Rural-1 and Rural-2 zones that were written for large-acre parcels, creating what the report calls a “misalignment” in entitlements and conservation incentives. (Item: AMD2026-0001.)

In the staff’s recommended direction, the county would retire two underused Planned Residential Development (PRD) tools — Rural PRD and Complete Neighborhood PRD (CN-PRD) — and retain the Floor Area Option (FAO), potentially refining FAO calculations to exclude waterbodies from “project site area.” The report says FAO has been the only PRD tool used consistently since the rural LDR overhaul adopted in 2016.

Separately, staff recommend applying Rural-3 site-development and floor-area standards to family-subdivision parcels that are six acres or smaller, while keeping Rural-1 and Rural-2 setback standards. Staff highlighted that Rural-1 currently allows up to 10,000 square feet of floor area even on very small lots — an outcome the 2016 framework assumed would be limited by a 35-acre subdivision floor that no longer applies to family subdivisions under WY §18-5-303.

The requested action from commissioners was direction on whether to proceed with a formal LDR amendment process consistent with the recommendations. Details are in the county’s Feb. 23 staff report: Planning Commission Staff Report.