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Monday’s County Council meeting was the last opportunity to amend Bill 18-26, the last of nine comprehensive rezoning bills. If you attended or watched the video, you heard a fascinating debate over the question of whether downzoning land to Open Space is an appropriate conservation strategy.
Here’s my take on it.
A big part of my job is to direct the Office of Planning and Zoning to engage residents in land use planning. Every decade we must update our county’s General Development Plan, review zoning of all parcels, and submit legislation to the County Council with proposed zoning changes.
A lot is at stake for land speculators, the entities who purchase land to later sell for a profit. If they can convince the county to upzone the land, or increase the allowable density of development on it, they profit handsomely. If the county chooses to downzone their land, the value could in some cases decline.
When I took office, I questioned the Office of Law about the conditions under which downzoning against a speculator’s will would hold up in the courts. I was aware that it had been done to protect a large part of Charles County and wanted to know our options. The answer was generally that downzoning to take away vested development rights may be hard to defend, but that if development rights don’t exist, they’re not being taken away, and downzoning can be justified.
The Region 5 bill that I sent to the County Council downzones to Open Space a 137-acre tract of land (parcel OR) that is part of the Two Rivers Planned Unit Development (PUD) in Odenton. Under the approved PUD, a maximum of 2,060 homes were permitted at Two Rivers, a level that has been achieved, but no development rights were granted on parcel OR.
I made the decision to propose Open Space zoning on the land because comprehensive rezoning is a once-a-decade opportunity to align zoning with local conditions. Parcel OR was designated for use as a golf course in the 2006 Two Rivers Special Exception that approved the PUD. Another Special Exception in 2013 updated the allowed use of Parcel OR to a golf course and/or an agricultural and environmental park.
The buyers of the 2,060 nearby homes were told that parcel OR would be a community asset. The developer signed agreements with both the Two Rivers and Forks of the Patuxent community associations that promised to conserve the land as well, but those agreements are not the point here. The special exception approving the PUD is what’s legally relevant.
The Stakeholder Advisory Committee and Planning Advisory Board approved the underlying Planned Land Use (PLU) for the parcel as Conservation. PLU is not in itself zoning, but zoning is intended to follow PLU. Downzoning the parcel to Open Space is consistent with the Conservation PLU.
Given the promises that the Two Rivers developers had made to protect Parcel OR, you can imagine the outrage that residents felt when news broke in January 2025 that an application had been submitted to the county to build 377 new homes on the property. It was part of the flood of applications that developers submitted before the start date of the moderately priced dwelling unit requirement. If these houses are like the ones already built, prices would be upwards of $950,000.
Two Rivers has no right to build anything on Parcel OR. They could secure that right by going to the Administrative Hearing Officer (AHO) and seeking a special exception to amend their PUD, but they have not done so. I have my doubts about whether a well-informed and neutral AHO would grant that special exception, but given our county’s history, I suspect that a future AHO with urging from a future Office of Planning and Zoning under a future County Executive might well do so.
My decision to use the comprehensive rezoning process to settle the Parcel OR question was compared by one councilmember to President Trump’s executive over-reach. I don’t see it that way. It is actually my obligation to submit zoning legislation to the Council after carefully considering the information brought to me by our agencies and our stakeholders.
Some suggested that the developer would beat us in court and overturn Open Space zoning of Parcel OR. That’s contrary to the opinion of the Anne Arundel County Office of Law, the legal advisors to both the administration and the Council.
Nobody on the Council suggested that housing should be built on Parcel OR. That case was only made in written testimony by the developer.
The Council voted 5-1 to amend my proposed bill, to keep the zoning that would allow the land to be developed if approved by the AHO.
The County Executive has the authority to line-item veto parts of comprehensive rezoning bills. The Council can override that veto with a supermajority of five votes.
Assuming that Bill 18-26 passes at the June 1 Council Meeting, I will veto the amendment to Parcel OR, Amendment Number 12. The Council will have the option of voting to override that veto at its June 15 meeting.
I believe that Councilmembers are still open to learning more about the Two Rivers story and about the viability of downzoning as a conservation strategy. With the right kind of respectful advocacy, we may be able to get the three votes we need to sustain the veto and protect Parcel OR. Doing so would end an expensive and time consuming battle, and would deliver the promise that was made to the county and its residents.
To Councilmembers and others who believe that protecting this land through zoning will discourage other developers from investing in our county, don’t worry. Our county is not in need of sprawl development at prices that our workforce can’t afford. What we need is development that aligns with the values of Plan2040 - smarter, greener, more equitable - and there are plenty of other developers who are willing to deliver that.
Until next week…