User:Acdixon/sandbox

In 1996, AiG petitioned the Boone County government to rezone 40 acres (0.16 km2) of land near the intersection of U.S. Route 42 and Kentucky Route 338 from agricultural to recreational use to facilitate the construction of the Creation Museum. After concerns were raised about the proposed location's proximity to Big Bone Lick State Park, an internationally known geological site, and that AiG's offices and mail order business proposed as part of the museum were inappropriate for the location the Boone County Fiscal Court voted 4–0 against the proposal in December. In 1998, requested the rezoning of an alternate 47 acre site south of Interstate 275.. The Kentucky Post reported that, "The public comments on the proposal steered clear of the religion-vs.-science debate that generated much of the opposition in 1996", but county officials again rejected the re-zoning request out of concern that building public water and sewer infrastructure to support the site would attract further growth to the rural area. .

The terms of all of the commissioners on the Boone County Fiscal Court expired in January 1999, and the new members of the court agreed to negotiate with AiG regarding their rezoning request. They eventually approved changing the designation from residential to public facilities, a lower-impact designation than industrial.. In June, a group of property owners near the proposed site sued the Boone County Fiscal Court and AiG, charging that fiscal court commissioners met with AiG officials outside the context of a public meeting and that Commissioner Robert Hay should have recused himself from the vote because he had a conflict of interest, but a judge dismissed the suit in February 2000.