Zoning in Monroe County: The New 2024 County Development Ordinance

What actually changed on December 18, 2024

Monroe County's County Commissioners adopted the new County Development Ordinance (CDO) on December 18, 2024, formally repealing two ordinances that had governed the county for nearly three decades: the Monroe County Zoning Ordinance, originally adopted December 20, 1996 as Ordinance 96-36, and the Subdivision Control Ordinance, adopted March 1, 1996 as Ordinance 96-09 -- both as amended many times over in the intervening years. Rather than another round of amendments, the county chose a full rewrite, merging zoning and subdivision-control provisions into a single unified document and updating the countywide zoning map to match.

The most immediately visible change for a land buyer is the sheer consolidation involved: the prior ordinance had accumulated 45 separate zoning districts over its nearly-30-year life, and the new CDO reduces that to roughly 16. That's a genuinely large simplification, not a cosmetic renaming -- district boundaries, names, and the specific uses permitted within each were all reworked as part of the process, which means a parcel's old district designation doesn't map cleanly onto a single new one without checking the current map directly.

Where the CDO does -- and doesn't -- apply

The CDO's zoning map update covers the entire county's jurisdiction with two carve-outs: the City of Bloomington and the Town of Ellettsville each retain their own separate zoning authority and were never governed by the county's ordinance to begin with. Within unincorporated Monroe County, there's a further wrinkle worth knowing about even though it predates the CDO itself: the area within a two-mile fringe contiguous to Bloomington's corporate limits falls under the jurisdiction of the Bloomington City Plan Commission and Common Council rather than the county, under Indiana's standard IC 36-7-4-205 fringe-area provision.

Practically, that means three potential zoning authorities could apply to a Monroe County-area parcel depending on exactly where it sits: the county under the new CDO, the City of Bloomington (either within its limits or its two-mile fringe), or the Town of Ellettsville. Confirm which one actually governs a specific parcel before assuming the CDO's rules apply.

What to check before relying on an older zoning reference

• Confirm a parcel's current zoning district under the new CDO directly with the Monroe County Planning Department -- any listing, GIS layer, or agent knowledge predating December 2024 may cite a district name or number that no longer exists
• Ask specifically what permitted uses, density, and dimensional standards (setbacks, lot size, height) apply under the parcel's current district, rather than assuming continuity with its pre-2024 classification
• Verify whether a specific parcel falls within Bloomington's two-mile fringe area (governed by the city, not the county) before assuming the CDO applies
• If a specific parcel involves subdividing land, note that subdivision-control provisions were also folded into the CDO rather than remaining a stand-alone ordinance, so review the current combined document rather than an older subdivision-ordinance reference