2030 Comprehensive Land Use Plan - Pitt County Government

program, to help solve the problem of computer and internet access in the ruralportions of the County.Objective 2:Encourage community gardens.Implementation Strategies:• Identify open County-owned parcels that could be used for community gardens.• Encourage clustering of homes and the use of open space for gardening wherefeasible.• Encourage homeowner’s associations to create community gardens in commonlyowned open space.• Consider requiring developers to set aside public open space as a condition ofdevelopment.Objective 3:Collaborate with public health department to educate residents about buying local foodand adopting healthy lifestyles.Implementation Strategies:• Encourage use of computer classes for farmers and others that would like toparticipate in a virtual farmers market.• Create tax incentives for local restaurants and institutions to buy food locally.• Collaborate with Pitt County Public Schools to include healthy food curriculums andencourage school-based community gardens.• Use community gardens to engage youth in agri-entrepreneurial endeavors.• Continue to encourage collaborative programs such as Eat Smart, Move More;ARISE (A Real Integrated Sports Experience); and the Food Literacy PartnersProgram, funded by the Pitt Memorial Hospital Foundation.• Continue to partner with WITN-TV to host Growing Up FIT!, a monthly televisionsegment designed to promote fruit and vegetable consumption, cooking at homeand physical activity.Access to Alternative Modes of TransportationThe built environment affects the health of a community. A healthy community is designedand built to encourage more walking and bicycling. The Centers for Disease Control report thatmany counties in the Diabetes Belt are historically heavy agricultural areas and as the economyturned to more sedentary lifestyles residents did not adjust their diets to compensate for lessphysical exertion.Pitt County has worked hard to improve alternative modes of transportation throughout theCounty. Pitt County adopted the Pitt County Greenway Plan 2025 in 2005. The planrecommended the consideration of approximately 215 linear miles of greenway networkprimarily along some of the major, critical stream and rivers in the County. The proposedgreenways consisted of approximately 155 linear miles within the Extraterritorial Jurisdiction(ETJ) of county municipalities and an additional 14 linear miles within the city limits of county2030 Comprehensive Land Use Plan Goals and ObjectivesPitt County, North Carolina 2-20