Zoning in Licking County, OH: No County Code, and Intel

Licking County has never adopted its own zoning resolution -- every township decides for itself, or doesn't. That same legal landscape is where Intel's Ohio One megaproject, one of the largest private investments in Ohio history, got built -- not through county zoning at all, but through annexation into a neighboring city and a rezoning most Licking County landowners never see happen.

This page covers what's specific to Licking County. For the general explanation, see the national guide.

The starting point: unincorporated, unzoned-by-the-county farmland

Before Intel arrived, the land that is now the Ohio One campus was ordinary unincorporated farmland in Jersey Township, Licking County -- a county with no county-wide zoning resolution of its own. Jersey Township did have its own zoning under ORC Chapter 519, administering that land like any other Licking County township. That changed through a mechanism that has nothing to do with county or even township zoning: annexation into a city.

In early 2022, a group of 117 property owners filed a petition to annex roughly 1,689 acres of Jersey Township land into the City of New Albany, whose primary jurisdiction sits across the county line in Franklin County. New Albany already had an established relationship with Jersey Township around its New Albany International Business Park, and Intel's site selection accelerated that annexation dramatically. Once annexed, that land left Jersey Township's zoning authority entirely and came under New Albany's own municipal zoning code -- a jump from unincorporated township land straight to big-city zoning, bypassing county zoning altogether because there was none to bypass.

The rezoning: agricultural to Technology Manufacturing District

Once the roughly 1,689-acre area (including approximately 900 acres tied directly to the Intel campus) was inside New Albany's limits, the city council unanimously approved a rezoning of that land from Agricultural to a newly created zoning category: Technology Manufacturing District. That new district was purpose-built to accommodate a use -- large-scale semiconductor fabrication -- that essentially didn't exist as a zoning category in this part of Ohio before Intel's site selection process began. Jersey Township and New Albany backed the transition with a 50-year cooperative annexation agreement addressing shared infrastructure and revenue from the site going forward.

Intel announced the site on January 21, 2022 as a $20 billion investment in two fabs, increasing that commitment to $28 billion in March 2024, and has described the broader mega-site as eventually able to accommodate up to eight fabs. As of the most recent construction-timeline update available in this research pass, crews had logged more than 6.4 million work hours and poured over 200,000 cubic yards of concrete, with completion of the first module (Mod 1) now targeted around 2030 and operations expected in the 2030-2031 window -- later than originally announced, a delay that has been widely reported and that local economic-development voices have described as giving surrounding communities more time to prepare for the growth still coming.

What this means if you own or are buying land near the corridor

First, understand that the mechanism that built the Intel campus -- annexation into a city followed by a city rezoning -- is a live possibility for other parcels near the New Albany/Jersey Township line, not a one-time event. If you own or are considering land adjacent to an annexed area, ask both the township and the city (New Albany, in this case) directly about any pending or discussed annexation petitions nearby, since annexation can change which government's zoning code governs a parcel with relatively little direct involvement from Licking County itself.

Second, recognize that the project's effects reach well past the annexed footprint. Johnstown incorporated as a city after the 2020 census pushed its population past 5,000, largely on the strength of anticipated Intel-driven growth, and Etna Township and other nearby communities have absorbed a documented surge in housing demand and land speculation. If you're evaluating land anywhere along the SR-310/I-70 corridor near the site, treat that growth pressure as a real factor in pricing, infrastructure capacity, and how quickly zoning or annexation activity can move on adjacent parcels -- and confirm current zoning and any pending annexation status directly with the specific township or municipality involved rather than relying on this page or older reporting for a live parcel-level answer.

Zoning in Licking County, Ohio: No County Code, and How Intel Got Built

The starting point: unincorporated, unzoned-by-the-county farmland

The rezoning: agricultural to Technology Manufacturing District

What this means if you own or are buying land near the corridor

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