Planning Commission Sends Data Center Text Amendment Suggestions, Flagging “Grandfathering” Practice For Development Rules

PRINCE FREDERICK, Md. — Calvert County’s Planning Commission reviewed data center text amendments at its April 21 meeting at the request of the Board of County Commissioners (BOCC).

Planning Commission members submitted their written comments ahead of the meeting. Top comments included the need for larger land and tree buffers around data centers, introducing a lower decibel limit for noise, and adding requirements for measuring and containing infrasound.

“I believe that if we establish restrictions and criteria, if somebody comes here and wants to do it badly enough, they’re going to have an engineer design something that will fit the criteria,” Planning Commission member Chris Gadway said.

Gadway also questioned the process for the comments, saying that the data center development process may have looked different had Planning Commission comments been taken into consideration before adopting the text amendments; Associate County Attorney John Mattingly Jr. pointed out that the Planning Commission is not a formal part of the process at this point, but the BOCC was instead asking for expert input.

Gadway and Planning Commission member David Bury voiced concerns about the concept of projects being “grandfathered in” under old regulations and zoning ordinances, worried that a data center project developer could take advantage of the fact that Calvert is in the process of updating the text amendments and skirt regulations that are put in place later.

To protect against this possibility, the Planning Commission voted to recommend to the BOCC that data centers can only be “grandfathered” into whatever regulations were in place when construction begins — and not any time before that date.

As a whole, the Planning Commission supported more restrictions on data center building and operation, including decommission plans, construction traffic mitigation plans, and daily noise guidelines, and asked staff to draft additional versions of the text amendments incorporating their comments.

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