The St. Mary’s County Planning Commission Monday evening unanimously recommended to the county commissioners approval of one rezoning and two zoning ordinance changes.
The planners agreed with staff that a mistake had been made in the current zoning of the property on which several Walden-Sierra facilities are located on St. Andrews Church Road. They agreed to change the zoning from Rural Preservation District to Residential Mixed Use. County Attorney George Sparling said the transfer of the property from the county to Walden was being held up because of the zoning.
The planners also agreed to recommend two zoning ordinance text amendments that had been delayed from an earlier meeting. One of the amendments would allow the Department of Land Use and Growth Management (LUGM) to create a new lot around an existing home in situations where two homes (or more) legally sit on one lot. Those situations occurred before the zoning ordinance was adopted and in some cases the homes are hundreds of years old.
Planning staff had recommended the change because Sparling ruled that the previous remedy of going to the Board of Appeals was not really legal according to state law. The new lots are in some cases necessary to obtain bank financing for improvements or to sell the house.
There was considerable discussion about whether the newly created lots should have to secure TDRs (Transfer of Development Rights). In the end the planners decided that since the homes already existed and their impact was already accounted for that TDRs were not necessary.
The planning commission also recommended approval of an extension of time to complete projects already in the pipeline. The amendment was proposed by staff due to the hardships on developers from the recession. Developer John Parlett, in speaking in support of the proposal, said the development community is now just digging itself out from those economic effects of the recession.
The extensions will be through May of 2017 for projects that expired beginning in January of this year. The new deadline was picked to coincide with expiration dates fort other state laws, including stormwater management regulations.
Several representatives from the development community spoke in support of the two zoning text amendments.
The planners on Monday also unanimously approved a concept site plan for two spec buildings, totaling 29,872 square feet in St. Mary’s Industrial Park on Airport View Drive in Hollywood. The buildings, for which no tenants have yet been secured, are being built by CMI General Contractors. They would be on Lot 19 in the industrial park.
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