§ 13.5-2. Definitions.
Unless specifically noted otherwise, the following definitions are standards throughout this chapter:
Alteration: Any change in the exterior appearance or materials of a landmark or a structure within a historic district or on a landmark site.
Applicant: The owner of record of a resource; the lessee thereof with the approval of the owner of record in notarized form; or a person holding a "bona fide" contract to purchase a resource.
Appurtenance: An accessory to a building, structure, object, or site, including, but not limited to, landscaping features, walls, fences, light fixtures, steps, paving, sidewalks shutters, awnings, solar panel, satellite dishes, and signs.
Building: A structure created to shelter any form of human activity, such as a house, garage, barn, church, hotel, or similar structure.
Certificate of appropriateness: An official signed and dated governmental document issued by either a local historic preservation commission or a governing authority to permit specific work in a historic district or at a landmark site of landmark which has been reviewed and approved.
Certified local government (CLG): A federal program authorized by the National Historic Preservation Act 16 U.S.C. 470 et seq., that provides for the participation of location governments in a federal/state/local government preservation partnership. The federal law directs the State Historic Preservation Officer of Mississippi and the secretary of the interior to certify local governments to participate in this partnership. Specific Mississippi requirements for the program are published in the "State of Mississippi, Procedures for the Certified Local Government Program."
City/town: The City of Yazoo City as represented by the board of mayor and aldermen.
Construction: Work which is neither alteration nor demolition. Essentially, it is the erection of a new structure which did not previously exist, even if such a structure is partially joined to an existing structure.
Demolition: The intentional removal of a structure within a local historic district or on a landmark site or which has been designated as a landmark.
Demolition by neglect: Substantial deterioration of a historic structure that results from improper maintenance or a lack of maintenance.
Design review guidelines: As adopted by the local historic preservation commission, shall be in a written form designed to inform local property owners about historical architectural styles prevalent in a community and to recommend preferred treatments and discourage treatments that would compromise the architectural integrity of structures in a historic district or on a landmark site or individually designated as landmarks.
Exterior features: Exterior features or resources shall include, but not be limited to, the color, kind, and texture of the building material and the type and style of all windows, doors, and appurtenances.
Historic district: A group of two or more tax parcels and their structures, and may be an entire neighborhood of structures linked by historical association or historical development. It is not necessary that all structures within a historic district share the same primary architectural style or be from the same primary historical period. A historic district may also include both commercial and residential structures, and may include structures covered by two or more zoning classifications. A historic district may include both contributing and noncontributing structures. A historic district is designated by the commission and approved by the city through an ordinance.
Historic landmark: A structure of exceptional individual significance, and its historically associated land, which typically could not be included within a local historic district or other appropriate setting. A historic landmark is designated by the commission and approved by the city through an ordinance.
Historic preservation commission: The Yazoo City Historic Preservation Commission, is a local historic preservation commission established to advise the local government on matters relating to historic preservation, including the designation of historic districts, landmarks and landmark sites, and which may be empowered to review applications for permits for alteration, construction, demolition, relocation or subdivision for structures in historic districts or on landmark sites or designated as landmarks.
Improvement: Additions to or new construction on landmarks or landmark sites, including, but not limited to, buildings, structures, objects, landscape features, and manufactured units, like mobile homes, carports, and storage buildings.
Landmark site: A location where a primary architectural or historical resource formerly stood or a significant historic event took place or an important archeological resource remains. For the purposes of this chapter, a landmark site encompasses prehistoric or historic sites on unimproved or improved land. A historic landmark is designated by the commission and approved by the city through an ordinance.
Landscape: Any improvement or vegetation including, but not limited to: Shrubbery, trees, plantings, outbuildings, walls, courtyards, fences, swimming pools, planters, gates, street furniture, exterior lighting, and site improvements, including but not limited to, subsurface alterations, site regrading, fill deposition, and paving.
National historic landmark: A district, site, building, structure, and/or object that has been formally designated as a national historic landmark by the secretary of the interior and possesses exceptional value or quality in illustrating or interpreting the heritage of the United States in history, architecture, archaeology, engineering, and culture and that posses a high degree of integrity of location, design, setting, materials, workmanship, feeling, and association. National historic landmarks are automatically listed in the National Register.
National Register of Historic Places: A federal list of cultural resources worthy of preservation, authorized under the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966 as part of a national program to coordinate and support public and private efforts to identify, evaluate, and protect the nation's historic and archaeological resources. The National Register Program is administered by the commission, by the state historic preservation office, and by the National Park Service under the department of the interior. Significant federal benefits may accrue to owners of properties listed or determined eligible for listing in the National Register.
Object: A material thing of functional, cultural, historical, or scientific value that may be, by nature or design, movable, yet related to a specific setting or environment.
Ordinary repair or maintenance: Work done to prevent deterioration of a resource or any part thereof by returning the resource as nearly as practical to its condition prior to such deterioration, decay, or damage.
Owner of record: The owner of a parcel of land, improved or unimproved, reflected on the city tax roll and in county deed records.
Period of greatest historic significance for a landmark: The time period during which the landmark had been essentially completed but not yet altered. It is also the period during which the style of architecture of the landmark was commonplace or typical. If a landmark also achieved historical importance in part because of designed landscape features, the period of greatest historic significance includes the time period during which such landscape features were maintained.
Relocation: The moving of a structure to a new location on its tax parcel or the relocation of such a structure to a new tax parcel.
Resources: Parcels located within historic districts, individual landmarks, and landmark sites, regardless of whether such sites are presently improved or unimproved. Resources can be both separate buildings, districts, structures, sites, and objects and related groups thereof.
Secretary of the Interior's Standards for Rehabilitation and Guidelines for Rehabilitating Historic Buildings: A federal document stating standards and guidelines for the appropriate rehabilitation and preservation of historic buildings.
Site: The location of a significant event, a prehistoric or historic occupation or activity, or a building or structure, whether standing, ruined, or vanished, where the location itself maintains historical or archaeological value regardless of the value of any existing buildings, or objects.
State historic preservation office: The Historic Preservation Division of the Mississippi Department of Archives and History.
State historic preservation officer: The director of the Mississippi Department of Archives and History.
Structure: A manmade object and typically will be visible because of portions which exist above grade. Structures built during the historic period, 1700 forward, may in some instances not be visible above grade if they are cellars, cisterns, icehouses or similar objects which by their nature are intended to be built into the ground. A structure includes both interior components and visible exterior surfaces, as well as attached elements such as signs and related features such as walks, walls, fences and other nearby secondary structures or landmark features.
Subdistricts: Discrete areas within a larger historic district within which separate design guidelines are appropriate and that may be created to recognize different zoning classifications or historic development patterns which have caused adjacent historic areas to develop at different times.
Subdivision: Any change in the boundaries of a single tax parcel, whether the change results in expansion or reduction or boundary relocation.
Substantial deterioration: Structural degradation of such a nature that water penetration into a historic structure can no longer be prevented, or structural degradation that causes stress or strain on structural members when supports collapse or warp, evidence of which includes defective roofing materials, broken window coverings and visible interior decay.
Survey of resources: The documentation, by historical research or a photographic record, of structures of historical interest within a specified area or jurisdiction or of existing structures within a proposed historic district.
Unauthorized demolition: The deliberate demolition of a historic structure without prior review and approval by a local historic preservation commission or a governing authority to which such a commission has made a recommendation.
Unreasonable economic hardship: The definition under constitutional standards used to determine whether a "taking" exists.
(Ord. of 10-25-2004)