Board of County Commissioners - Regular Meeting

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Thursday, July 30th, 2026 open session for the Board of Carroll County Commissioners. As we always do, we'll begin with a Pledge of Allegiance and a moment of silent reflection. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, I hope everybody's doing well and enjoying the absolutely beautiful weather that we've been having the last few days. Commissioner Kyler, I believe we start with you today.

Thank you. I'm sure somebody else will talk a little bit about the Farm Museum event and hopefully about the WANCE celebration of life. I was actually most of the weekend at Johns Hopkins with a granddaughter while my wife was in Denver with a granddaughter. And so we missed both events. But it's deepest sympathy to the Wants family and good luck to the Farm Museum. And the granddaughters are now here for a week. And they go to a concert tonight and leave tomorrow. So Rhonda and I will be back to sensible life, maybe. Went to a technical review here, and it was four solar projects and one auto, I don't know if repair dealership, something project. It was very interesting. If you haven't gone to them, staff did very well. Chris Hein talked about solar for our over an hour, an hour and ten minutes, maybe prior to the meeting and answer questions. And then it was interesting when people were motivated in Carroll County, they they they do what they need to do 9 a.m. meeting I don't know how how far ahead they're advertised the Reagan room was totally full I don't think there was an empty seat and it stayed full till for at least two hours and then as different Sessions ended some people left but and there were a fair number there at 1 or 1 30 whenever it stopped but but I want to thank the staff it was interesting meeting and It's interesting what the different projects are told At a technical review, so I'm glad I went At night I had a solar hearing for a project on Cape Horn Road at Westminster Library. I got to co-host it with a judge that I've co-hosted a few with. So it was interesting. And again, that was an evening meeting advertised. There were two people there. One signed up to speak and then one other one did speak. And I was surprised they didn't have more input. I think, and we need to keep fighting, obviously, but I think maybe the citizenship's learning that the state's overruled us and there's some things we have no choice about. And doesn't mean we like it, doesn't mean we don't fight it, but in the end, it'll happen. Went to a cabinet meeting. That was good. Our staff's always good. Went to Durbin House's ribbon cutting. That was awesome. Great crowd there. And I've seen that building years ago and then since the city was working on it and talked to the contractors as they were working on it. And it's awesome. And the level of detail they did, I I complimented them for the level of detail on the fireplaces, the interior. But I think one of the things that really showed so many people in today's world like nail shutters to the outside of windows and they look pretty. These were on real hinges. real hinges from a long time ago and worked and it just was awesome what all they did. Went to workforce development and met Deputy Secretary Jason and met a lot of intern students and staff and also talked to some of the workforce development staff about things they need and how blueprints affected them and various things. that have happened over the past few years. And one of the things which I saw at Board of Ed and I see here with many departments beyond workforce development, but grants are great and our county does so well at getting grants. I don't think people realize how much money we get in grants, but the problem is if a grant has a position in it and it's good for three years, what do you do in the fourth year when the positions really worked out? Well, do we make them a County employee and pay that? Um, and, and they always try to find another grant or extend a grant, but it really happens. And I saw it with a school system and I, and I see it here. You run out of the time. And you have to decide, is it best for the county to have another employee or not? And it was interesting to talk to them about that. This afternoon, we do our, I think, quarterly meeting with the health department. And that'll be great discussion. I went to Shelter Systems' 50th anniversary. What a family and what a company. And it was so interesting to hear from them And then at Workforce Development, one of their, I think, board members, one of their people there, they're speaking, was the actual HR person from Shelter Systems. So good company, and they had a great event. And I don't know if people see all the details, but the security force was pretty extensive. I forget their name. It was a catchy name. And I commented on that, so they wanted me to meet the boss and owner. And it's touching. I have a friend who was head of the SWAT team in Baltimore County that this guy was on. They were great friends. And prior to that, they were on other groups together. Mike came home from a SWAT duty on a Sunday, laid down to take a nap and have a stroke and passed away. And 10 years later, his stepson, who was also a Baltimore County policeman, ran off the road, I think fell asleep, going down Black Rock Road to work and died. And the good news is Mike's grandson graduated this year from the Naval Academy. So there's good stuff. But and and. It's like our SROs. Policemen are so friendly to the community. And Mike's gone, so I can't get him in trouble. My middle son and a couple other kids were making movies. He was in maybe junior high. And it's called The Tom and Eric Show. And they went to Mike and they said, we would like you to come to our house and arrest us, put us in your police car while mom takes pictures, and then we'll make T-shirts. And they did. I don't know if you guys remember the movie, but the Tom and Eric show, Lamos Get Out of Our Yard. And Mike said, yeah, yeah, I'd love to do it. I love kids. make sure you blank out my badges for any photos but he did it and it's funny talking to the security guys there they said that was him he loved kids and they they said if we could bring him out back to life today we would do it and uh it's it's uh it's great how uh police can be so friendly to the commuters last thing and uh and i'm sure commissioner garen's going to talk about mount airy Last week was Reese Carnival. This week was Hampstead Carnival. What we try to do with the local carnivals is at least stop most evenings and grab something to eat. And we've been to both. Reese Carnival, I got the privilege on Saturday at 11 p.m. of drawing the winners for all their raffles. And it's just, it takes so many volunteers to run a carnival. And and they do it well and and I think both carnivals had to close Tuesday night. because of weather but I think both carnivals had some record nights because it hasn't been 100 degrees and it hasn't rained it's threatened but uh yeah I wish Hampstead still has uh tonight tomorrow and Saturday so please go out and support them I think that's the last one in Carroll County but uh And they all need our support. And unfortunately, they all need help with Carroll County weather the week they have their carnival because that can make it or break it. And it was great seeing volunteers at both events and great seeing paid people at both events. And a lot, lot of workers. Thank you. Thank you very much, Commissioner. Commissioner Gordon.

Good morning, Carroll County. I wanted to mention just a couple of things from the past week. So as Commissioner Kyler mentioned, the shelter systems 50th anniversary milestone was last Friday. That was quite an exceptional event. It was a pleasure to join in the celebration, but also learn a lot more about the company. and the family that founded it that went from family business to respected industry leader here based in Westminster. Very great testimonies about the history of the company, how they treat their employees, their commitment to the community. I wanted to mention this real quickly. They have a tremendous support for the community and generously give back to a wide variety of groups. I'm only going to mention a couple. including nonprofits such as Youth Service Bureau and the Boys and Girls Club of Carroll County. So just incredible to have a 50-year family-owned entity in our community and wish them all the best. I'm going to be really brief on the Reese Carnival. We were there last week as well. Always good to get out and support our volunteer fire companies because these events, as Commissioner Kyler mentioned, with the weather sometimes make it a bit tricky, but These are the events. These are the events that help fund our volunteers. And any time we have an option, be it a carnival or any other type of event, we really should get out and support our volunteer fire companies. I truly appreciate all their dedication in volunteering. Also, we had the Durbin House event, which was a wonderful event this week. It was exceptional to see that the city was able to get funding from a variety of sources, grants, and other sources to have that building properly restored and conserved. That building, I believe, now might be the oldest building. public used building, and when I say public, I mean as in government used building in Carroll County. I think the closest one would be the old jail over here near us. I think that this one actually does predate that building. One interesting little fact, and Chris has the picture up, these are some of the items found during the restoration, and there's a child's shoe. which I'm not sure how I feel about this, but they found it in a wall. And of course, there's a tradition to putting shoes in walls. I might have left it there. It's supposed to ward off evil spirits. So I don't know if we're going to get a potential movie script from some creative person in Carroll County in the future, maybe. But some neat artifacts were found uh it was wonderful to have uh richard crest there that uh was involved in the city obtaining that property years ago and also was great to have some of the original durban or some of the descendants of the durban family there as well i believe there's five family members so just a great great opportunity for the community and this property is going to be well used in our community which glad to see Also wanted to mention real quickly, we're down to the five finalists for this year's Carroll Biz Challenge. Out of 29 local entrepreneurs, these five are the final five, and this will be August 13th at the Carroll Arts Center, which is always a great event, but also good to come out and support small business, growing small businesses. It'll be interesting to see how this plays out this year, as always. There's going to be over, I believe, $30,000 in cash and prizes that'll be awarded to the various finalists and how that plays out and then very briefly want to mention that this past weekend had the opportunity to attend the night at the Farm Museum event couldn't ask for better weather I don't know who ordered that but they did a great job great event perfect weather well attended everybody I talked to really enjoyed it it was a fundraiser to raise funds for the Farm Museum for a number of projects they're working on I know from a number of the folks I spoke to, the hope is that this is the inaugural event, not just an event. So looking forward to hearing more about that and where they may go with this in the future, and that's all for me. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Commissioner Gordon.

Commissioner Geary?

Good morning. Good morning, Carroll County. Good stuff, Commissioner Gordon. Thank you. And yeah, the Monterey Volunteer Fire Company carnival is ended. I think the weather cooperated a little bit towards the end of the week. They had some rough patches for sure. Anecdotally, it looked like maybe attendance might have been down a little bit, but hard to say from the parking lot there. Yeah, I appreciate the comments about our volunteer fire companies. We will continue to remind Carroll County residents the importance of supporting them. And you do have a community volunteer fire company where you live, so don't forget about them. And if you want to donate, you can go to their website and do so. That's something people do often. But if you want to contribute, you can do that online, and it would be very much appreciated. And that's all for me.

Thank you very much, Commissioner. Commissioner Krebs. Thank you. I'm glad Brian Boki's here, Director of Public Works, because I had a call yesterday afternoon from a gentleman called to praise the painting that was done in his development by grandsons. They've been paving, I think, for a week or so. And neighborhood roads were paved. And he said the working people were very cordial. They were helpful. They put in new curbs. And they did a fantastic job. And he just wanted to make sure that we heard some positive feedback. So make sure whoever needs to get that feedback gets it, please. So that's always good to get those kind of calls. I don't know anything about shoes and walls being good luck. But I do know that we had a burn a few months ago. And they found $30,000 in a can. and before they burned the house, and the money was so old that they had to take it to the Federal Reserve to cash it in because the banks wouldn't take it. So think about the value of that. I don't know how old that was, but the value of that money would have been today. So I'd like to understand the history about the shoes in the wall. But I'm not putting my money in the wall, I'll tell you that. Commissioner Collier mentioned yesterday we had the workforce development directorate, Deputy Secretary Jason Perkins Cohen from the state of Maryland. And it was a very interesting morning. See, they're all mourning and learned a lot as well. It's for our summer employment program, the enrichment cohort. And it's a work group of students. And they're doing active learning. And things like elevator speeches, how to handshake, and just they did a whole thing the right way to handshake or the wrong way to handshake. And also, um, how they got their first jobs. We had a whole panel of business people that were from the workforce development board members of local Carroll County, and each of them spoke about getting their first job. And truthfully, it wasn't about resumes and everything was more about relationships and, um, just getting one job to lead to the next job, and just making sure you go to work. Not just sitting around, because it's not like we all sit around and wait for this lightning rod to hit us and say, this is what I want to do when I grow up. That doesn't happen that way. And pretty much everyone on that panel said the same thing of how they got started. And one thing led to the other and had multiple unexpected job and career changes. But that's sort of the way it happens when you just get out there and start working. So it was a really good morning spending with these students. And they had some very good ideas. And I think all of them left more hopeful about just getting to work and showing up on time. being ready to learn, ready to work, and ready to work with people and get along. And that was the message from these workforce development board members. And one of them was Margaret Welliver from Shelter Systems and told her story about, you know, her career and then taking time off and then how her one career led to back at Shelter Systems. She's the Director of Human Resources. So a lot of, I appreciate the volunteers that came out, the business people. It was a panel of, what, six or seven of them, taking their time from their businesses to explain how they got started. And I think it was very, very useful to the students. It was very useful to everybody in the room. So that program is very well run by Heather Powell. And I think they do it every year. And it was mentioned as a grant program that we use. But hopefully help those students be able to get working.

All right. Well, thank you very much, Commissioner. Thank you to all of my colleagues for their excellent comments and their continued active participation in the community. As always, I'm going to be very brief myself this morning. So along with Commissioner Gordon, I had the pleasure of attending the first annual night out at the night of the Farm Museum event, the fundraising dinner this weekend. The intent, obviously, being to generate additional funds for capital projects at the Farm Museum. I want to thank everybody who was involved with putting that event together and everybody who attended the event. It was very, very well done, and I think it was a very successful evening. And then secondly, just a brief reminder that this coming week is National Night Out. Tuesday, throughout the county, law enforcement first responders are going to be coming together with other agencies, other groups and organizations. uh for events in each of the county's towns allowing the community and the people who serve it to continue to get to know one another even better than they already do and to continue to build a very close and effective working relationship with one another so i just want to remind everybody that uh tuesday again is national night out and so with no other comments we'll move straight into our agenda item number two the bge finksburg uh to westminster transmission line replacement project update uh please come on down if you are from bg e

did you two call each other this morning or how'd this work out that's how well we work together I think he has it up as a PDF

So good morning. Good morning. County commissioners, my name is Chanel Brooks. I am the external affairs manager for BGE. And I want to thank you all for allowing us to come back to provide an update on this important transmission project. So we will walk through the presentation. First, we will start off with the existing transmission line that's there. The purpose for this project, where we currently are on the project, And then next steps. And then thereafter, if you have any questions, we will answer any questions that you have. So with that being said, I will transfer it over to the project management team to provide you an update and just some history on the project itself. Ben?

Good morning. My name is Ben Formosano. I'm a transmission engineer for BGE. Good morning.

My name is Kyle Edmonds. I am the project manager for BGE for the project.

And if needed, we also have our public outreach consultant here with us today. So I know we've presented this before, but just some project background. We operate an existing transmission line from Finksburg to Westminster. that was built in the 90s, overbuilt from a distribution line. This line's faced a lot of maintenance issues from woodpecker damage, vegetation damage, difficult to access through the area that we have with wetlands, the railroad, the valleys that we cross, and then also some steel degradation and difficulty in performing that maintenance when it's needed. This image just shows a little bit of the issues that we face on this line. Like I said, the creeks and wetlands, the railroads, the access constraints of the vegetation and terrain. In addition to the access issues, we have these aging infrastructure concerns, like I said. Woodpeckers really like these old wood poles that we have out here creates a big concern for us. And then we also have some stream erosion causing concerns for the ground line of the structures.

Yeah, sure thing. So, you know, based on where we are right now with the existing line, we had to go back and do some homework and do some research. So, you know, the plan is to replace the existing overhead line and develop an underground route with a duct paint three by three and support of the new installation for the circuit line itself. So we're in the process of designing this work. We actually filed CBCN in April of this year to support that scope of work. And we're awaiting our administrative hearing, which is scheduled tentatively for the middle of August. And then once that line is built out underground, the plan is decommissioning the overhead line that's currently existing, which is scheduled to happen once that underground line is completely installed and built out.

And one thing I wanted to add, Kyle, to that is that we submitted both options to the public service commissioner overhead and underground. So they will make the ultimate decision on what option would be best for this project. Thank you for sharing that, Shannara.

Essentially, this is just showing our next steps right. We have already filed for CPCN with the PSC in quarter two of this year. They forecast a three- to six-month turnaround time, so we expect a decision by October of 2026. Once that decision is made, we will then move forward with currently finishing up the design for the work as well, which is happening tentatively in October of 2026 as well. But right now, we are officially on hold until we get that decision back from PSC.

And those are the current updates that we have for this project. Are there any particular questions that you have regarding the project?

I have a couple. And thank you for this. This has been like three or four years in the making. And I really appreciate the pivot from the original. I never realized that they put the original poles in by helicopter. And I thank you for the picture of the woodpecker holes, because when they described that to us in our first meetings about this four years ago, or three or four years ago, I didn't realize how big the woodpecker holes were. So a couple of questions. It says the existing overhead line will be removed except for the segments containing distribution under build. What is that? What will we expect to be taken down?

So the distribution under build is the cross arms and distribution that's but kind of in the midline of the pole, the transmission line is on the upper section of the structures. So where we have both the transmission and distribution will remove the transmission wires and insulators and will cut the top of the pole off from above the distribution if it's there on on some of those areas of the line.

And does that easement actually go away or is easement still stay on the property?

We will need to keep some of the easement where we do have those distribution assets, and the rest of it I'm not sure of.

And you mentioned that the CPCN filing is going in front of the Public Service Commission soon. What are the chances of this getting approved like it is? Is it pretty certain that we'll get? Should we write some letter saying we support this version of it? Because this is what we've asked for, which we very much appreciate going underground with it. Is there anything helpful?

We do welcome support letters for the project itself, period. So if you are interested in supplying or submitting support letters, please do to the public service commissioner.

So when you actually put these in front of them, you gave them two choices. Do they normally take the choice that you recommended, which is the underground?

It kind of depends on the pros and cons of each option. We've pretty much stated what we would recommend from an underground standpoint. And we're hopeful that there will be an agreement with that process. But we definitely are just waiting for the hearing to figure out what next steps.

And the reason I'm asking that, because the original proposal was pretty controversial, where the above ground was going to go because it can't follow the same path because it just had to bring it in by helicopter. So if the other proposal you said they'd have to go a different way, what is that path? Have you determined that path?

So to answer your first question, we were very detailed with our recommendation, and we provided that feedback from the controversial standpoint that happened years ago. And then secondly, if it doesn't go our way, we'll have to go ahead and re-evaluate everything and look at a whole new scope of work and redesign that works for not only PSC, but the Carroll County community.

No, and I just want to make sure that it's not something, because there are dollar differences, and I'm not sure what that value is, but the value of what we're going to, The value of getting this done more quickly and having a path that everyone really wants, and we really appreciate going underground. I think it's going to be less maintenance, and it's going to be more structurally sound after we had that tornado or terrestrial, whatever it's called, came through a number of years ago. But I just want to make sure that we think it's pretty certain that they're going to go with the underground and not have to go in a different way.

Yeah, we're feeling relatively calm.

So do you think it would be helpful if we put a letter just saying how strongly we support it?

Absolutely.

I'd like to just make a motion that we ask staff to put together a letter for the reasons just stated of why we support the underground and how, I would just say that. But it's going to take a lot longer if we go in a different route.

Yeah, and just going back to your question about the financial difference, just to keep in mind, there is a significant difference when you go underground as opposed to aerial. So it's about four to five times maybe more to go underground as opposed to go aerial. It depends on what the dollars are, the total dollars. Exactly.

I mean, obviously, it's a short transmission line, so I'm not sure where that dollar figures. But I have a second for that.

So, yeah, we have a motion. Do we have a second? Second.

We have a second. Can the rest of us talk before we make a motion? Sure.

Well, we got a motion on the floor. We have a second open for discussion in terms of the letter supporting the project in the underground.

I had questions for them. Sure.

We're open for discussion at this point. We have a second for the motion. Okay.

You want to do that on a second and now because I think sorry, I don't get to talk.

It's already seconded. So so we can just vote on that. Excuse me, Commissioner Krebs. Let me let me manage this, please. Okay, so I understand that. My apologies. We have a we have a motion and a second for the letter supporting the project in addition to the fact that we favor the underground option. So we have that motion. All in favor? Aye. Opposed?

Yeah, I'm not ready to vote. I think we ought to get to talk. Okay. And I understand, Commissioner Krebs, you always want to be first and you want to monopolize. And we should get to talk.

We're not going to start characterizing motions up here.

I'm not characterizing. I'm stating a fact.

I understand you're stating a fact. I'm sitting here. I'm watching everything myself. So thank you. We've had a motion. We can revisit. If we'd like to amend the motion and revisit that, we can. But I'm opening the floor up to you at this point, Commissioner Cobb.

It passed, right?

It did. 3-1. But we always have the option up here of...

want to amend a motion and change it but commissioner kyler please you okay by all means um i want to thank you guys for the meetings that we've had and the emails you've had and the communications otherwise sometimes by phone um and i think i think we're trying to meet up during mako i'm not sure if that got scheduled yet or not but but yeah we want to do that my question is my My understanding at the earlier meetings was this probably was underground, and I know that's your guys recommendation. Probably what else can we do with PSC? Can we testify? Can whether be hearings? What else can can we do other than write a token letter to make sure this gets underground? And then my second part of the question is PSC. also going to look at the route or is that established? It'll be along 140. It's just, will it be underground or overhead?

So I guess I can address your second question of how are they looking at the route? So the route that we have, they are different physical routes of the overhead or the underground.

Where is the overhead?

The overhead route, the The current route is the cross-country route. It does not go along the road, along 140. The other overhead route in consideration was the greenfield route that went up to the north and then through the northwest. The underground route goes south and then along Route 140.

And I think it's as important to Carroll County that it be underground as the route pick, too. So both of those PSC could, and I assume they could even come up with another alternate if they so choose. Or you think it's pretty, you're pretty confident they're going to pick one of the options?

Yes, we're pretty confident they'll pick one of the options that's presented to them and not propose a different option. Thank you.

And to answer your first question, there is an administrative hearing coming up. I'm not sure if they allow public testifying comments, stuff like that. But you can issue letters in support of the Underground Route to help us with that administrative hearing.

Can we get info on the hearing and what is allowed? Yes, I will provide that information to you all.

Any more comments or questions from the board on this issue? Mr. Boki, you'd like to speak?

Do you want me to reach out to the city of Westminster as well for perhaps a letter? Great idea.

That's a great idea.

Okay.

Thank you. Any further discussion on item two from the board? Okay. Seeing none, thank you very much for being here.

Thank you all for allowing us to provide the update. Very much appreciate it. Have a good one. Thank you, guys.

Thank you.

The item number 3. Change order request for additional construction phase engineering services for the improvements of the Hampstead wastewater treatment plant.

The Office of Procurement, in cooperation with the Division of Utilities, requests the Board of County Commissioners approval of a change order to JMT in the amount of $189,009.77. This will be for additional engineering design and review services associated with the improvements to the Hampstead wastewater treatment plant. The change order is within the adopted budget.

Commissioners, as outlined in the briefing paper, this change order provides additional construction phase engineering services associated with the Hampstead Wastewater Treatment Improvement Project. This change order will extend those services throughout the completion of the project. Since the construction began last year, unforeseen field conditions, contractor-related issues, and owner-directed revisions have required additional construction phase engineering support involving building foundations, building construction, sludge press equipment, controls integration, and plant operations. The additional engineering services primarily include expanded field inspections and quality assurance during construction, additional technical reviews and responses to contractor questions and proposed changes, continued review of equipment submittals and startup activities, and final inspections, the preparation of record drawings, and project closeout documentation. With that, I'd be happy to answer any questions that you may have.

Thank you. Do we have any

Questions or comments or do we have a motion.

The Board of Commissioners approve a change order to Johnson merriman and Thompson Inc in the amount of 189,009 dollars and 77 cents for additional engineering design review services associated with the improvements to the hampstead wastewater treatment plant project.

We have a motion to have a second second. We have a second all in favor aye aye opposed. The motion passes unanimously. Thank you very much.

Thank you.

OK, we're going to move on to our next item. This is a public hearing. Propose amendments to chapter 150, forest conservation. I call a public meeting to order. Mr. Burke.

Good morning, Commissioner. This one's going to sound familiar. It's a proposed amendments to the Forest Conservation Ordinance, which were mandated by state law. We advertised this one in the Carroll County Times on Thursday, July 16th, 2026 and the 23rd, 2026. With us are Director Chris Hine, Janet O'Meara, and John Bowman. If They'd like to do a short introduction to what's being proposed and what's different from this one and the last one, and then open the floor to the public.

Thank you, Mr. Burke.

Good morning, Commissioners. Good morning. So this is our second public hearing for amendments to the Forest Conservation Code, Chapter 150. So we were here before you in June on the 18th. But shortly after that public hearing, we received a revised code from Maryland Department of Natural Resources. There were some changes in that code that we presented to you on July 9th that we felt warranted a second public hearing to give the public an opportunity to comment should they have concerns on those so we do have a brief presentation for you this morning it too will look familiar but we're going to run through that real quick and go from there okay as a brief reminder here changes around the forest conservation code have occurred over the years and there's been some evolution of how the

State's policies with forest have protected and dealt with forest. And it's always been intended to reduce development-related forest loss. In 2009, the code was changed to essentially give an idea of no net loss of forest. And now the state's attitude is about increasing, actually, the acreage of forest land in the state. So the purpose of Chapter 150 does some basic things. It conserves the county's forest resources. It's intended to protect trees and sensitive areas for development. And it ultimately implements the State Forest Conservation Act at our local county level. So the main reason why we're making the changes is because there was a Senate bill passed in 2023 related to changes required by the state.

And the staff chose to ease certain requirements.

And here's a summary basically of what was included in the changes. Related to the Senate bill, addition of some priority retention areas across the county, which results actually in about half the county being considered priority forest. requirements related to clearing priority areas. So these are mostly related to public notification around those clearing of priority retention areas. There were some revised mitigation requirements related to increased mitigation for stream segments that were unforested, but reduced mitigation requirements around things like multi-family dwellings, building in priority funding areas. Retention banking would be a new mitigation option we haven't previously had that's being added. And then a revised stream buffer definition. The staff recommendation recommended changes focused around the applicability threshold change, which was a big easing of the applicability threshold from 20,000 square feet of forest clearing, easing it back to 40,000 square feet of forest clearing. Several exemptions were tweaked. The AG exemption, an exemption around lots that would be created and given to children. or owners of properties. Our tree planting maintenance period shifted slightly. If you could show that you had met certain requirements, you could have a three-year maintenance period rather than a five-year maintenance period. And we would, with these changes, be adding a fee-in-lieu option. So essentially, a developer, as an absolute last resort, could put money into the county fund to complete their mitigation requirement. Any questions regarding those changes?

Can you at some point just give us the details you just mentioned? I didn't get them all written down, what the changes were. Just whatever you just wrote from is very interesting. Just email it to us so we have those details. And will this change, do you think, the cost for it's going to lower the threshold so less people have to be required to do things? Does this apply to forest mitigation and just clearing of just disturbing land, or is it just of the forest piece? Because then we have to do mitigation on just clearing land with no forest. Is this applicable to both?

Yeah. So the applicability change is related specifically to forest clearing. So it's changing it from 20,000 square feet of forest clearing now, which it is to 40,000 square feet. So it's easing it back. That's definitely going to affect probably mostly some single family lot new home construction where folks, when they do their single family home, are right at that threshold of 40,000 square feet right now. And well, they certainly were over 20,000 square feet when we had it at that level But now the 40,000 square feet it's going to give them the possibility to come in with their project and stay under the threshold and not have the but if they don't have forest on their property if it's just if they don't the applicability did our change in applicability and does nothing to change that situation.

Is that the same? Is it the 40,000?

It's the same. We have a 40,000 square foot disturbance threshold and 40,000 square foot forest clearing threshold with this proposed change.

And with the other changes that are being made, the maintenance period, do you see that possibly the costs will go down?

I mean, we hope so. We hope that there'll be a bit of cost savings there for some developers who choose to pursue that option.

I mean, some of it has to do, I think I mentioned, I just had another conversation with Springfield about their tree program. They have a very robust tree program. Tens of thousands of trees are planting. The Department of Health, along with BGE, but they're planting mature trees. And they've had such a... phenomenal success with it because they're mature and they're not and I'm not sure we plant these little sticks and half of them you know half of them don't live three quarters of them don't live but I'm not sure what their their program is through BG but they're trying to reforest a lot of the property over there the state property and there's thousands of them and there's I mean I think there's tens of thousands but they're definitely a larger specimen to begin with which is more expensive but then you don't have to keep replacing them Thank you. I think it's moving in the right direction. I just didn't know if the costs were maybe we'd have a chance to bring the costs down for these properties.

We hope there'll be certain situations with the change in applicability where folks will avoid the cost of forest conservation altogether.

Good. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner Krebs.

Yeah, I should probably remember. And I do like the fees and I do like the threshold stuff and we need to encourage people to grow trees, not just pay their way out. But the revised stream buffer definition, did that have significant changes or anything we should be concerned about?

No, not really. So we had previously used a variable stream buffer that the county had, and it was at a minimum 50 feet. Sometimes it would extend out much further than that, depending on calculation. What the state said is we have to use a 50-foot buffer off of intermittent streams, so streams that run periodically throughout the year but not all the time, and 100 feet off of perennial streams or streams that are always there. So I don't anticipate much of a significant change with that. Thank you.

OK. Thank you very much. Ms. Windham, do we have anybody here present for public comment?

Yes, sir.

Mr. Swam, do we have anybody on the line for public comment?

I have no one on the line, sir.

OK. The options before the board are to close the public hearing and adopt the proposed amendments or close the public hearing and leave the record open for 10 days to have a motion.

Real quick Mister Honda we have any any incoming feedback from the public regarding this.

so i can when we had held the previous public hearing we did have miss alec votoff that called in the day that we were before you she had two comments mainly one stating that the commissioners can always choose to have regulations that are more strict from the state And I think that was kind of her recommendation. And then she also asked that fee in lieu not to be an option for mitigation. Other than those comments from Ms. Votoff, the only feedback both Jonathan and I have received has been from developers, home builders, single family lot home builders, asking when these regulations would go into effect.

And we have had extensive outreach to various agencies and groups, to survey groups and planning commission and so on and so forth that are all public meetings. And we've had very minimal feedback. But as Janet just said, we are aware that there are some, especially single family builders,

that are anxiously waiting for this to be passed so that they can move forward and and that the new regulations apply to them i appreciate that i just want to make certain that was my impression but i wanted to confirm that with you all obviously want to have as much input as we can from the public if there's public input coming in um given that we've had such limited uh input across the board on this and there's already been the previous i'm going to move that the board of county commissioners close the public hearing and adopt the proposed amendments second

We have a motion, and we have a second. Any further discussion?

I just want to mention on the lady that called in about the fee in lieu of, the trees still have to be planted, right? We get the fee, but we still have to make sure. So they're getting planted. It's just they're not taking care of the plant. And it's a pretty rigorous fee, pretty expensive fee. So it's still getting done. And so we're going to be totally aligned with the state right now. We're not going to have any additional requirements. Is that accurate? Yeah.

That's pretty much the intention. We have one or two minor things in the code, which is slightly more stringent than the state in a few areas. But for the most part, we're aligned with the state's code.

Well, we want to be as aligned as possible. And keep in mind, most of these homeowners, when they do purchase their lot, they're going to put stuff up. It just doesn't count because it's not a forest. They're putting up trees or putting up pine trees. They're going to fix up their lot. So they are doing things. They just don't get credit for those very expensive things that they put up there. They'd rather give the credit for the sticks. But we're losing forest. We're just losing the type of forest that they call forest. So I thank you for making this alignment, because it does add. We talk about affordability of homes. These are the kinds of things that add to the affordability of homes. And you mentioned about planting on their own property. Then it has to go under easement. And then you can't do anything with your property. So if you have a quarter acre, you've got to put it under easement. You've just given up that piece of property for future if you ever need it. So that's why a lot of people don't want to put it in forest conservation on their own property. Thanks for explaining all that. I found out the information I have is in the bottom of this handout. So I'm fine with it.

OK. Very good.

Thank you.

Mr. Burke, should I have closed the public hearing before entertaining the motion? I just want to make sure we're doing things.

Yes, officially, yeah.

Okay. Do I have a motion to bring the public hearing to a close?

I apologize for... Second.

Okay. Motion is to bring the public hearing to a close. All in favor?

Aye.

Opposed? Okay. The motion to close the public hearing has been unanimously approved. Now on the table is a motion to... close the public hearing, and adopt the proposed amendments. We've had a motion. We've had a second. All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed? OK. And those pass unanimously as well. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you, guys. All right, Mr. Hine, you're going to. hang out for a little while yes more than a little while actually item number five um this board we're we're going to take a look at the water resources element potential adoption

Good morning we are here before you today about the water resources element

it's only a couple slides so yes ma'am sorry I gotta make sure the zooms back up thank you thank you So we're here today for consideration for adoption of the water resources element. The water resources element, of course, is a long-term planning tool for public drinking water, wastewater, and water quality, and any resulting limitations to growth that it might reveal. You'll recall that on June 18th, The plan was introduced to the board on July 16. The board held a public hearing on the plan document. The record was then held open for 10 days for any additional comment, which we received no additional comment. In fact, we've received no comment from any public hearing across the planning commissions, the councils, or as a result of your public hearing. So we are here today to request your consideration to adopt the water resources element, which would be followed by signing an adoption resolution.

Move the Board of County Commissioners adopt the 2024 water resources element.

We have a motion for adoption. Do we have a second?

Second.

We have a second. Any comments or discussions from the board on this item?

Sorry. This sounds pretty simple, that you turn on the faucet and water comes out. But this document is only done every 10 years. And it's really important. We just take it for granted. And flushing the toilet. We take it all for granted. But what I've seen in here, and after looking at the annual report last month, I do read your report. Thank you. I'm not going to. I did not read the whole thing but I read a lot of it and I've got my one from ten years ago but what concerns me is the fact that we have yellow lights a lot of places and there's opportunities for expansion but I'm also looking at our permits in place about growing and I'm also looking at our school enrollments I'm just bringing this up because I'm disappointed that the Planning Commission doesn't have some comments on these things because Right now, until we start getting some of these additional water sources appropriated and getting some money out the door or some water capacity, we're not putting in any building, which means your school enrollments are going to continue to crash. And that's not good. And when we start having to close schools again, not we, but when the enrollment's not there around the county, people are going to say, what happened? Well, it all starts with being able to build and having the water. So I would hope that it's a really big deal to say, can we get more allocation for everybody? Because in Freedom, we have plenty of allocation because we got a Liberty Reservoir. But our schools are pushing up. And we don't want to build more schools, especially when you have capacity other places that are not close by. So I think it's important that we have a conversation about how do we help accelerate, make sure that these, I know Westminster's doing a good job on the water reuse. I'm not sure when that goes live and what they work enough for years, and maybe some of these other towns, but I'm not sure how we're helping them with both the water and the wastewater. Because this is what leads to be able to do to build at a slow growth rate to keep things up. And if you just fall off, have no growth, and you lose students, and you end up saying, what's going on here? And then it's too late. So this is a really important document. I appreciate it. And I wish some people had weighed in on it and read it and realized this is the basis for being able to, unless you're on a well and septic, which We don't approve well in septics. We don't have tiers, so we can't build a well in septic either, really. So we really can't do much else. I know some people say, don't do anything, no growth. Well, you start losing school enrollment and closing schools, they will change their tune. You have to have a certain amount of sustained, predictable, reasonable growth everywhere to fill in. So this is important. And I look at the yellows and the reds, and it concerns me. So I'm just raising the red flag that I think The Planning Commission is actually responsible for making sure we have a sustainable plan, and I'm disappointed that they didn't weigh in on all of this and say, what can we do to help these municipalities? I know with Union Bridge, we've been trying to help them with their wastewater, which is important.

thank you very much for that and and you're absolutely right this is an extremely important aspect of growth in the county and and so that's why this is in what's called an element of the master plan and so uh now it's it's so significant that it's own it's its own standalone document but it absolutely is a component that needs to be considered as we work through the master plan for the county for the next 10 years so i appreciate your comments thank you and thanks for putting it all together it's good

OK. So we do have a motion and a second for adoption all anymore any more further comment or questions. OK. All in favor. Aye. Opposed. Thank you. The motion passes unanimously. Thank you.

Thank you. All right.

The next item in fact the next three items do involve public comment. So if you're here and you would like to make public comment please. I'll fill out one of the cards in the back and give it to Ms. Windham. It's also worth mentioning that the next three items, the question before the board will be whether to send these proposed text amendments to public hearing. I think that's important to mention. So with that said, item six is a briefing discussion or decision regarding age-restricted communities and homes.

That's it.

Good morning. Ms. Daly. So as you mentioned, we're here to convey the Planning and Zoning Commission recommendations related to one of the uses affected by the Freedom Area deferral, and that is for age-restricted housing. So in our presentation, I'm going to go through just a quick review of the direction that we were given, sort of where we came, where we started from, how we came to this point. I'll touch on the public and stakeholder outreach that was done and then give you a summary of the Planning and Zoning Commission's discussion and recommendations and we'll talk about next steps and the staff requests which is a request to send the recommended code amendments to public hearing so Really quickly for review of direction, I'll touch on the concerns and deferral ordinance, the report and recommendations that you all received from the consultant Michael Baker International and your direction to the Planning and Zoning Commission. So back in fall of last year, there were a number of concerns that were identified related to age-restricted housing. Those centered on things like the consistency of the zoning code in our development practices with our planning documents, Overall site design related to how age-restricted communities interact with the surrounding communities. And then specifics related to those communities centered on the density of that development, things like emergency service access, roadway widths, parking, open space and amenities. and the provision of universal design or other aspects that would help people age in place. A deferral on this use was passed for the Freedom Area on December 18th of 2025 and that affected five projects that were in process. You can see those listed here. It's a total of 688 units that are contained in four age-restricted communities that are being proposed and one development that is classified as an age-restricted home so at the beginning of February of this year Michael Baker International was hired to help us with the process of analyzing how we might be able to address these concerns and specifically some amendments to our code that could help Very briefly, you've already received the consultant's report and initial recommendations, but I'll just touch on those to set the context here. The analysis that the consultant did identified five general categories that are areas for improvement related to age-restricted housing. They focused on things like scale and compatibility of projects, making sure that they fit the scale of surrounding neighborhoods. A relative lack of community amenities, because these are things that are not required by code to be provided, so that's a bit of a discretionary item. universal design or aging in place features that currently are not required. Although many developers, because this is their product, will work those in but we don't have any requirements related to them. A disparity between zoning and the expectations around zoning versus the product that often results with age-restricted housing, which allows for a significantly denser type of development. And then questions around emergency access and site design and how we're making sure that emergency access is is sufficiently provided. So the primary issues that were identified by the consultant is that we don't have robust standards related to age-restricted housing, and there is a heavy reliance in our process on the discretionary review of plans, allowing for the Planning Commission to try to make sure that these types of issues are addressed. The consultant didn't find any specific inconsistencies between our planning documents and our zoning ordinance, but identified several areas where there's room for improvement. These recommendations were presented to you on April 28th, and you provided the direction to the Planning and Zoning Commission to develop code amendments that would help address some of these concerns. so the planning and zoning commission discussed age-restricted housing amendment code amendments at five different meetings they received an introductory presentation from the consultant on June 3rd and an initial review of the recommended code on June 16th On July 8th, we had continued review of the recommended code. That went over into a meeting on July 15th where they also had a developer Q&A. I should say in between the June 16th and July 8th meetings, we also had a public meeting down in South Carroll that allowed for significant community input on some of these concerns and then at their July 21st meeting they had a final discussion and made their final recommendations on the code amendments Touching on the public and stakeholder outreach and input so far, as I mentioned, we had a community meeting on the evening of June 24th at the Senior Center down in Eldersburg, where we received significant verbal comments. And we also had a public survey that people were able to fill out both in paper and that was open for a couple of weeks online and pushed out through our communication channels to get some feedback from folks through a public survey. We also had public comment during all of our public Planning and Zoning Commission meetings. As I mentioned, they also held a developer-focused Q&A session at one of their meetings and of course have received numerous email comments that have helped inform their discussions and decisions. I just briefly want to highlight a few of the responses that we got from the community input survey. A number of questions were asked that were directed at helping pull out from folks what their preferences were, what some of their concerns were related to age-restricted housing, what they might want to see in the age-restricted communities and homes of the future. we had a number of responses that provided open-ended comments and you can see at the top of this slide that a lot of those comments focused on making sure that age-restricted communities are practical practically designed that they are accessible or allow for some Aging in place to occur that they're safe. They're affordable and they're connected to the larger community the highest priorities focused on Making sure that people who buy into these communities can age in place Through various design features that support that making sure that there's plenty of parking for both residents and visitors of course making sure that it's a safe community both in terms of ease of moving around the community as well as receiving emergency service when that's needed. Trying to ensure that there is an affordability component here as well so that there are practical amenities that don't make the price of homes in the age restricted communities balloon out of proportion. and that to the extent possible, we're trying to facilitate reasonable home prices. And then community design was another high priority, emphasizing open space, modest amenities like mature landscaping and walking trails, and just trying to retain the rural character that draws people to Carroll to begin with. The next slide is a little bit more of that type of feedback. It gives you a sense of what people said they don't like and conversely, what they would like to see in age-restricted communities. Again, emphasizing options for people to age in place. convenience for moving around and parking at the in the community's safety green spaces and being connected both to each other and the larger community. These responses were shared with the Planning and Zoning Commission and then also integrated into the analysis that was provided to them in terms of recommendations and feedback for specific code revisions. OK, so we'll dive into the Planning and Zoning Commission discussions. I just want to briefly give a little bit of context for what they're looking at here in terms of how the code is supporting the Freedom Community Comprehensive Plan. So I don't want to dwell too long on these slides, but I do think it helps to set the context for what the Planning and Zoning Commission has been looking at so the Freedom Community Comprehensive Plan has a lot of different recommendations that sometimes are not in conflict with each other, but make it difficult to do everything all at once. So there is language in the plan about making sure that we have a variety of housing styles, a variety of densities to serve people of all ages, and to, at the same time, make sure that we're not radically changing the character of the community. there is recognition in the plan that the population not just in freedom but in the county in general is aging and that there is a need for providing housing for folks who are growing older and want to stay in the community. So looking at ways for housing to be provided for folks who are looking to possibly move out of their larger single family home into smaller attached or detached types of housing that would allow them to age in place in their community but in a housing type that's a little bit less maintenance intensive and then here you can see there are a number of recommendations that were specifically addressing housing and the need to provide a variety of housing types and where appropriate higher density in the freedom area but also ensuring that we are not transforming the character of the communities and that new housing is consistent with the character of the existing communities and lastly just want to point out many of the age-restricted communities are located in the our 20,000 zoning district which equates to our residential medium density land use designation and there is specific language in the plan related to that land use designation that calls out 55 plus age restricted and retirement communities being provided in that in that those areas at a density not to exceed 3.5 units per acre which is what our zoning code currently provides for So that's the context for looking at these code revisions. Of course, what we're talking about here would apply countywide. But if we're talking about higher density housing that has to be on water and sewer, public water and sewer, most of that is going to be located in an area like the Freedom District where we have county controlled land that also has public water and sewer. So you can see here the categories that the consultant touched on in their recommendations for potential code amendments. I'm not going to go through the planning commission's recommended code amendments by these categories. But just so you know, all of these categories are woven into the various code amendments. Sometimes it's easier to pull them out than others. But I'll walk you through what hopefully will be an understandable way of diving into the more detailed code amendments, we're certainly available to go through the specific language in the code at any time. Okay so we'll start with the principal uses that are recommended by the Planning and Zoning Commission. So currently we have age-restricted homes that are conditional uses in certain zoning districts the recommendation is to change this use to a principal permitted use because with better defined requirements and review process that doesn't is not so discretionary the multi-step approval process that we go through right now in which a development is first reviewed by the Planning Commission then goes to the Board of Zoning Appeals for a conditional use and then comes back to the Planning Commission Is no longer necessary and this would simplify and clarify the process for reviewing this use I same thing with age-restricted communities which are defined as sort of a mix of attached and detached single-family dwelling units you can see on the left hand side the zoning districts that that use is allowed in and the recommendation is also to change that from a conditional use to a principal permitted use We have a proposal for a new use which is an age-restricted community that includes an age-restricted home. So we actually have at least one example of this type of use in the Freedom Area. which is Winterford Manor that has the image on the right-hand side of the slide shows this community. It's got an outer perimeter of single-story quad housing and then an interior that has, I believe it's three-story multifamily housing. so this is a single development it was built many years ago under a different set of regulations if we wanted to encourage something similar to be possibly constructed in the future which allows for that transition between the higher density center and some lower density at the edges we would need to allow for something like this use new use age-restricted community including an age-restricted home okay we have some proposed amendments to chapter 91 which is our fire fire code and the proposed changes would define a the term fire lane which would ensure that emergency access within age-restricted communities as well as any development across the county would have some minimum minimum standards for interior roadways. So here we have the standards that are being proposed which include a clearance of 20 feet of width and 13 and a half feet vertical clearance. the requirement that they would be in place for building construction and beyond so that if anything happened during construction emergency access would be available a requirement that they would be designed to allow access to within 50 feet of a building entrance or 150 feet if the building is sprinklered and a requirement that multiple fire lane access points to the site could be required. This would also require turnarounds and markings to ensure that there is no parking along the fire lanes. There's also recommended text to address access to the rear of buildings to make sure that there is safe access all around the building and that there is a minimum of 20 feet between buildings so that fire vehicles could get between buildings in the event that that's necessary moving on to density and housing mix so I'm gonna go through this by category of building type or development type so talking about age restricted communities the recommendation is to have some varying densities allowable for these types of communities depending on the zoning district so in our 20,000 which is our generally half acre lot zoning district the recommendation is to keep that at three and a half dwelling units per acre which is what's specified in our planning documents in the R10,000 and R7500 zoning districts which currently don't have a maximum density the recommendation is to set a maximum density of six dwelling units per acre in the commercial one and commercial two districts the recommendation is to allow that to be approved by the Planning and Zoning Commission rather than set a specific density for age-restricted communities and that is the same as what it currently is. With respect to the mix of housing, so this was something that was a concern in terms of the design of communities and and how they relate to the neighboring developments the recommendation is to for projects that have more than 50 dwelling units that they would be required to have at least 30 percent of those units be single-family detached style housing as a way to help retain the character of existing communities which for the most part in this area would be single-family detached housing and to provide some sort of assurance that there would be transitions between existing communities and new communities in terms of that that housing style and housing density For age-restricted homes, touching on the density, the recommendation is that in the R10,000 and R7,500 zoning districts, which is the only residential districts where they're allowed, the density would be set at one dwelling unit per 3 000 square feet of the total parcel area this is what it is currently it's the equivalent of 14.5 dwelling units per acre and as you see on the slide the metric has been in place in our county code since 1971. in the commercial one and commercial two zoning districts the recommendation that a density maximum be set at 20 dwelling units per acre for the new use of age-restricted community containing an age-restricted home the density the recommendation for density was also 20 dwelling units per acre with a housing mix requirement that 70% of those dwelling units are be in the multi-family homes so that you don't have sort of an imbalance of homes versus the community style housing that would create a greater density than you were anticipating moving on to some of the recommendations related to community design standards we have a number of things here that reflect some of the concerns that were voiced back in the fall starting with building spacing as I mentioned earlier there is a requirement or recommended requirement of minimum 20 feet between buildings to allow for both emergency access as well as more opportunity for open space and retaining that sort of lower density character to the community. With respect to townhomes when they're provided, the recommendation is that there would be a maximum of five dwelling units attached within within each block. and a maximum building width of 150 feet so you would have to meet both metrics so how wide a townhouse unit is would also have to fit within that 150 foot maximum width so in in some cases if you building a product that's significantly each unit is significantly wider than 30 feet then you may not be able to get five units in a row there are some recommendations related to architectural features that would need to be shown on the plans and reviewed and approved by the Planning Commission everything from a variety of roof pitches and breaks in the wall plane to indicating the types of materials that would be used. there is a recommendation to include some required universal design features and this relates to at least one step free entrance front doors that are a minimum of 36 inches in width and a minimum 36 inch wide interior quarters and doorways to facilitate ease of movement throughout the unit for those who may be mobility impaired then there are a whole host of recommended universal design features that would help to support the notion of aging in place in the the units and finally several recommendations related to safety and security including ensuring that there's ample lighting throughout the community to illuminate walkways and entrances we have a number of recommendations related to parking design standards some of them vary by the type of project. For age-restricted communities, we are keeping the parking requirement at two parking spaces per dwelling unit and adding a requirement for one guest parking space for every five dwelling units. For age-restricted homes, parking requirement would be one and a half parking spaces per dwelling unit and one guest parking space for every ten dwelling units additional parking requirements relate to driveways ensuring that they are wide enough for people to get in and out of their cars easily especially if they're using walking assistance devices or that sort of thing so a minimum 18 foot long and 12 feet wide if attached to a single car garage or 20 feet wide if attached to a two-car garage Guest parking requirements kind of expand on the minimum of the number to indicate that they have to be evenly distributed throughout the community. There are some parameters to ensure that people don't have to walk a super long distance between guest parking and the units in the community. So no dwelling could be more than 600 feet from the guest parking. and guest parking can be provided both on street or off street but if it's on street it needs to be striped to indicate specifically where that guest parking is allowed and we have to make sure that fire lane access is maintained Moving on to some additional circulation types of recommendations for pedestrian access. We have requirements that are being recommended related to sidewalks, sidewalks that are along roadways would need to be a minimum of five feet wide with a two foot buffer between this the roadway and the sidewalk if you're talking about a sidewalk that abuts a parking area there would not be a buffer required but that that sidewalk width would need to be six feet wide If a pathway is being provided, we have a couple of recommendations for minimum width of those. If it's just a pedestrian pathway, the minimum width would be five feet. If it's a shared use pathway in which you're anticipating both bicycles and pedestrians using that, the minimum width would be 10 feet. with a specification that they would have to be paved with some kind of hardened material either gravel or like an asphalt pavement there are also recommendations to include open space standards this is not something that currently is required the recommendation is to require a minimum of 25 percent of the gross area be reserved as open space. And of that 25%, a maximum of 50% of that could be open space that has environmental features such as steep slopes, streams, or ponds, or stormwater management facilities on it. Also, of that 25% required open space, a minimum of 10% would have to be suitable for active recreational use. And you see in the box there an example of how this would calculate out. If you had a 100-acre site, you'd be required to provide 25 acres of open space. Twelve and a half acres of that could be environmental and counted towards your open space requirement. Two and a half acres would have to be suitable for active recreational use. The last section that I want to touch on in terms of the code recommendations relate to amenities. There was a fair amount of discussion on whether or not amenities should be required, and if so, what types of amenities should be required. we heard both in the feedback that we got from folks as part of the survey that they're not looking for extensive amenities they recognize that those often drive up the cost of their units and the homeowner association fees modest amenities are the types of things that people seem to be looking for we also heard feedback from the developers of these projects that often the amenities they provide aren't heavily used with that feedback in mind the Planning Commission decided that they would recommend that an amenity report be required and submitted as part of the concept plan. And in that, the types of amenities being provided would have to be described and detailed. along with a long-term maintenance plan for them but that there would be some discretion in terms of what those amenities are so that they could be provided consistent with the type of community that's being proposed and the size and the the type of market that the developer might be going after. So the Planning and Zoning Commission would review and approve that plan as appropriate for the community or the home being proposed. We've also added in a recommendation that the amenities would have to be completed prior to occupancy of 50% of the dwelling units and that they would have to be bonded so that we can ensure that they are constructed and accessible to the residents before the project is closed out. So that's a summary of the Planning Commission's recommended code amendments. Obviously, I think you got a copy of the redlined text, which is much more detailed than the summary that I've provided here. as I mentioned we are happy to sit and go through that detailed red line with you at any point as far as next steps are concerned what we're here today asking you for is permission to go ahead and schedule a public hearing that we would anticipate for September 3rd the meantime we could have public meetings we could have work sessions whatever your pleasure is then we would have the public hearing on September 3rd and hope to have something adopted no later than September 17th. This would allow us to have the code in effect by September 27th to meet the October 1st date in which residential projects are vested under the laws in effect at that time. So our staff request, as I mentioned, is to schedule a public hearing on the proposed text amendments I do just want to point out for anybody who might be watching now or afterwards that the proposed code amendments can be viewed on our county website. On the left-hand side, you see both the QR code as well as the steps that you would need to get to that if you're just clicking through from our homepage. We would suggest anybody who wants to submit comments to please send them to both the Board of County Commissioners and the Director of Planning and Land Management, Chris Hein, so that we can keep track of those and make sure they get entered into the public record. So with that, I will try to answer any questions that you have.

Okay, questions now before public comment.

Yeah, I was gonna I was gonna ask what the preference of the board would be. I think we're gonna have a lot of discussion and comments. So you want to? I was gonna ask for public comment now. We're in the room and online and then we can. Can we can we like so this is for people who are here? Okay, thanks.

feeling card I have is Kelly.

Thank you. Good morning, Commissioners. Kelly Schaefer Miller, 73 East Main Street, Westminster, Maryland, 21157. We understand that the topic before you today is an introduction of this amendment to go to public hearing. I'm sure that through your review of this, you will see the Planning Commission discussion on this amendment and the thorough engagement through that process. And I can assure you that the developers remain engaged through this process before you. Today you were shown or I guess listed the five plans in process that would be impacted by this amendment. I would submit to you and I would say you've probably seen most of them in detail that these are good desirable projects that are all consistent with the master plan land use designations. Most of them if not all of them have been in review for between four to five years. That's engineering review and a great deal of investment in the county in that time. I want to be very clear that the current amendment as drafted would restart the process on almost all of those plans. That is the impact that it would have. So while everyone remains engaged, because I think I speak for all of the plans and process, everybody wants to see a workable amendment if one gets adopted. That does not mean that that amendment is workable for the five plans that have been processing pursuant to the existing county code. So I would request today that you consider, and I'm sure you will, the need for continued public engagement, work sessions and discussions and dialogue on these amendments so that you can hear from the stakeholders. how these would be applied, what the impacts would be, some real-life examples of projects that have developed in other surrounding counties. And for that reason, today I would request that you consider delaying the public hearing that's been, I think, requested for September 2nd or 3rd to allow for that time, for that thorough review and dialogue. And I am hopeful that you will all have those work sessions and hear from people about the impact of these amendments. So thank you for your time here today.

Okay, thank you. Do we have any more public comment present? Okay, and Mr. Swann, do we have anybody on the line for public comment?

I have no one on the line, sir.

Okay. All right. Seeing nobody on the line, do my fellow commissioners have any comments, questions? Commissioner Tyler?

Yes. And we're now eight months into the process. And almost all of these changes, which I'm fine with, will increase the value and cost of a home. And that's OK if we think it's worth it. My question was, on page two, slide four, the five projects listed, what is the status of those? Is public comment correct that this would cause them to restart the process?

So I can run through the various projects. So Freedom's Grant is currently working on developing their final plans. So they are very far along in the process. Eldersburg Overlook is working on final plans. Reservoir Run recently went to BZA for their, did they go to BZA?

No. Not yet. I'm sorry.

So Reservoir Run is early in the process in that they have been to Planning Commission to discuss density. Their next step is to go to the BZA following our current code for conditional use. And then their plans would be submitted for discussion at Planning Commission for concepts. So they are early in the process. Piney Ridge Villas just recently went to Planning Commission for their concept review, so they're now working on their final plans. And the Legends at Lures Avenue is very early in the process as well. Regarding the impact of these codes, we did reach out to the developers and provided them a summary list of all of the codes and asked them to respond individually on each specific code and whether that would be whether they already conform whether it would they do not but it would be a minor issue to address or if it's a major issue to address we have gotten those responses back but that was this week so we have not had a time to compile that and provide to the board but we absolutely will provide that to the board so you can see what each individual provision of code how that would impact each of the the projects that are being deferred currently deferred okay

And my hope would be we could look at those results and maybe accept some of these. I hate to see them have to start over. On page 10, on access standards. A fire lane with 20 feet unobstructed, a lot of our existing subdivisions wouldn't meet that. 20 foot so pretty wide fire truck the rear of the buildings in Maryland you can't build anything that's not sprinkler correct so my question would be 450 feet from the rear so in a lot of these cases if a fire truck's on the street in front of the house it's when within 450 so is that okay um very few existing subdivisions um have access to the backyards um and and i know that was a talk about this this doesn't say backyard but It gives feet footage and I'm wondering if the intent is backyard or just the distance. On page 11. Minimum space between buildings 20 feet. Again, a lot of subdivisions don't have that, but my question would be. So if it's 20 foot between my house and my neighbor. and I put a fence 10 feet between, is that allowed?

Yes. So if I may clarify, so the requirements that we're talking about here are for on an individual site. We're not talking about subdivisions where it's individual properties. Yeah, I understand. So the idea is that uh the 20 foot spacing between buildings is not is for both um accessibility so you from a great perspective and from what people have when they're between buildings we're not anticipating that you would have to be able to drive a vehicle between there but at least a um personnel stretcher that sort of thing could get around and it also provides for a spreading out of and an increased open space to open up the community some so you don't have buildings jammed up against each other so there are those two requirements but I think to answer your specific question related to access and so on the intent is not to be able to drive back through that 20 feet and drive from behind buildings it's just so that there it is feasible to access the rear of buildings

okay um page 13 um the identify long-term maintenance plan for amenities um so long-term plans for maintenance and maybe that's the intention they definitely restrict the homeowners association on what they do. If it would say replace them every 10 years, that takes some money. So is the intention here that the developer restricts the homeowners association on how they maintain amenities?

The intention is more primarily to identify who's responsible and what that maintenance plan would be so that the Planning Commission is aware that when these amenities are constructed, what's the understanding of the viability long-term and who's going to be responsible for that. And then that would be up to the Planning Commission to review that and determine, yes, that's sufficient. We're comfortable with what's being presented and approve that plan.

So what happens with the amenities? I think this also says completed prior to 50%. So at 50%, I think, the homeowners take over the homeowner association until 50%, the developer, because they own more than half the lots, are in charge. so the intention might be whatever a three-year guarantee on a structure and then the homeowners take what's the options because i just see this as restricting the homeowners which maybe maybe it's a good thing because a lot of them seem to misunderstand what their dues are for yeah um but what what's the intention

Yeah, the intention here is that if there are amenities proposed on the site plan, such as a clubhouse or a gazebo or those sorts of amenities, that by the time you get to 50% occupancy, that those residents that are there, they have access to those amenities. Because the concern right now is that there are projects that are well completed, and the amenities still haven't been constructed. And so people are living there, and there was an expectation and promise that they would have these things, but they have not been constructed yet. So in a construction-facing perspective, I can understand maybe a developer would wait till the very end to construct these and bring them online. But we feel it's important that if you have 50% occupancy,

that those and those residents would have access to those and those amenities um the one thing that i think um we're again we're tying the hams of the homeowner association we had a subdivision uh we proposed a pool It wasn't in at 50%, so the homeowners were in charge. Well, they came to us and said, we don't want the liability of a pool. We don't want the maintenance cost of a pool. Can you do a pavilion, a building, you know? And we accommodated what they wanted, but in this case – they don't get to say because they don't control the homeowner association yet so um i i'm i'm wondering if uh 60 wouldn't be better than 50 so the homeowners literally have a say about it yeah and and this was a few years back so maybe homeowners maybe those laws have changed but i don't think so OK. That's it. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner. I was going to just work my way down the line here. Commissioner Gordon, anything at this time? Nothing for me at this time. Thank you. Commissioner Krebs? Yeah, actually, you mentioned that the developers associated with these five projects have had an opportunity to comment, and you've received all of those back. Is that right? OK. And I want to follow up on something Commissioner Kyler just mentioned. So the homeowners would 60% I want to make sure I understand the 60%

well my my question was the developers in charge of the homeowner association until 50 so if all the amenities are complete essentially the the real owners of the home have no say about changing them or or whatever i'd i'd like the roof to be green or you know they they have no say about it so i'm just wondering if unintended consequences do we really want the homeowner association to have zero say about them.

Okay.

That was my concern. And, and, and I think, and I didn't say it, but I understand the public comment on delaying things, but I think we can ask questions and get answers and do it. Um, I'm, I don't know if I'm in favor of a work session, but, but if we need to do that, we can stick it in. Right. Absolutely. Okay.

So thank you. Thank you, commissioner. Commissioner grabs.

Sorry, I have a lot going on here. Thank you for all this. And it's very well laid out at the beginning. And I know in the original documentation that the consultant did is put a purpose paragraph. And one thing I remind people, In all these plans, we have underlying land use. And they're designated, this is what you can do on this land, this land, this land. Then we have certain special things that we do on that land. And retirement community or retirement home is one that we used to have, and now we're going to break it into two. What we've broken into two, but we're doing it more specifically. So that and clustering is something special you can do. I mean, I know people have said we've got a moratorium on this. We don't have a moratorium on these properties at all. We have something called a deferral. You can build on this property right now, all these properties. You can build what the underlying land use says you can build. They've decided to pick something that we did not have defined very well, and we're finding that we've had some problems with. these very vague definitions. So the particular thing they want to build of calling it a retirement village and all the benefits that supposedly go with it are what's being deferred until we get it better designed. And I definitely agree. One thing I definitely agree with the development community on is we need more specificity so they can go into this and not have this problem. And I've noticed in the towns, and I'm not positive, but it seems like they don't have as much disagreement on their master plans because it sort of comes up intrinsically. in with the county and hopefully don't repeat this ever since i've lived here these master plans have been a problem problematic in how long they take they take years and years and years and and then you get finished it and i have a box like this of the stuff from the last master plan and i go by i go through it and i go and we ended up pretty good the land use was good the problem was in the definitions and we've i'm going to go through some of that and i will i go back through lots of communication that was written during that time And clearly, the people on the council that they asked to participate said, our zoning definitions are archaic. They need to be upgraded, updated. And they really weren't. And this is not you. You weren't here then. I'm not speaking to you. I'm speaking to the past. And then again, they were rolled out over time. They weren't really vetted, and I do not believe they're aligned. And I have lots of background on that, but I won't get into all of it. So anyway, the purpose paragraph, why do we want to do retirement homes? And I don't want to read it here, but I know in the planning commission someone questioned it. Like, why do we need a purpose paragraph? Well, why are we doing this? We're just doing it because we want to call over 55 and have them live in the same place. Now, there's a reason that people are doing this. I'm not going to get into the reason, but I think having that purpose paragraph is important. We can fine tune it. Why are we allowing it? I call it bonus density. Give it whatever it took. We're allowing certain things to occur for something in return. And it's not one size fits all because there's different sizes of property. And as you get into the details, what do you allow on a five acre lot of parcel versus a 10 acre versus a 500 acre? And obviously, it can be different. So some of the things need to be more you know, marketing-driven versus systemic of what should be in it. There's two things to me that are very important. Number one is safety. road with. This is something I didn't even realize until I started seeing people parking on sidewalks and trucks that could not get through a neighborhood. And they had to park on the sidewalks because the roads weren't wide enough. Why? Because there was no extra parking. The parking is at the discretion of the Planning Commission. Not blaming them either. But you need specificity of parking. I've been to these communities all over All over. I've visited many, many of them. They all have parking. Some aren't enough. I know even at Carol Vista, they had parking. And they're saying now they don't have enough. There's never enough. But you have to remember, these houses are close together. And depending on the type of product, most of these are four bedrooms. They have three bedrooms up. Most of the ones we're getting here in our area, which I don't care for, are three-story townhouses. They have three bedrooms upstairs, one on the main floor, and some can put a bedroom in the basement. Well, most people that are aging up don't really need all these bedrooms. Or they have other people living with them. So there's not just one or two people living in these houses. And you're paying for a lot of space that you don't really need. But that's all we offer. Because it's a lot more lucrative to build this way. So we've seen all those things. So in the purpose paragraph, why are we building these things? And we do want affordability. And I'm going to state, none of these houses we're talking about are affordable in any definition that we have out there. So this affordability thing. It's not even close to being affordable, based on the definitions that we have. So the purpose, why are we allowing this product to be built? And I wish we did not have the situation that people had moved this far in advance, because we had such little specificity. And I say misinterpretation. I believe that early on in some of this process, some of the stuff was misinterpreted. And I'll just give you an example. Now, I could give you, I could go back and follow all this all the way through and just show you, but I'm going to just read one thing, and it's called Freedom Comprehensive Plan in June 20th, 2017. Common misconceptions about the accepted plan. It's a very long document. It's like 20 pages. Came from Cal County government, from the planning department. I just found this in my, I love to sit and read this stuff at night instead of doing something fun. So I won't read this one. Myth number two, the plan proposes thousands of new homes, including townhouses and apartments. They write, this is from Carroll County government, sent to everyone. Fact, the plan proposes a mix of land use designations that remains dominated by resource conservation, reservoir, and agricultural lands. The resource lands compromise 64% of Freedom's land area. As stated on page 93 of the accepted plan, the potential number of residential lots under the current zoning and freedom is 3,951. The future land use designations proposed in the plan increase the number to 4,347. Therefore, this plan increases a potential residential lot yield by 396 houses. OK. townhouses would only be permitted on one property, the Hobie-Wolf property. So this is your own people telling us it. That's why I get irritated, because people say misinformation. I agree with you. There's so much misinformation in what we are being told. And it's all in this packet. It's all in all the stuff we talked about. It's all in all the comments. And the misinformation has come about how it's being interpreted. And I don't know how we got from this and how it was interpreted. And what I read in the code, it does not allow for townhouses on R40, R20, or R10. That's just the way it reads. It says, it will be x. And if anybody reads the zoning book, I get disappointed at the Planning Commission meetings. I'm sorry, because they don't even have the zoning book in front of them. I don't even know if they have a copy of it. Well, that's what you're supposed to be interpreting. And somebody tells you something, and they're like, OK, well, that's not what it says. And I learned a long time ago, and I think I've trained some of my colleagues, it's fine to listen to somebody. But you must always say, in Annapolis, show me what it says. And they tell me one thing, and I read it, and I say, well, that's not really what it said. And I've learned that a long time ago. And that's what's happened here. It's not really what it says. So read it. And I've read it over and over and over. And this sort of confirms it, just this one statement. And I could go back and show you all the testimony and what was said. And that's why I get irritated, because I I sometimes hear people say that people don't get engaged. There are a lot of people who do get engaged. I've always been engaged. I've got testimony and factual information. And I quote from the source. I don't just say it. I quote it from the source. Here's what it says. Here's what the code says. Here's what the master plan says. I sent out documents to everyone saying, here's what it says about housing. I actually shortened it so everybody wouldn't have to read it all. Like, this is on page this. Go check it out. Okay, so try to produce that stuff so it's easy for people. So when I read...

I'm sorry, if I may, I'm not familiar with that document that you referenced from 2017. I just found it in my archives, and I have a lot more, but I will give you a copy of it.

I would love to see it. And you'll say, oh, these poor people. Okay, sorry, because a lot of this is, they're saying it was a myth. It's not a myth, because that's exactly what's happened. And that's why people don't trust it. That's why people get an attitude about it, like I do, and I'm sorry, but that's why, because... You're told a certain thing, and then all of a sudden, it comes out, and you read it a certain way. And I still read it the way that we, but that's not how it's been interpreted. That's why we have townhouses, hundreds, hundreds. We have 800. 685 new ones. We already have how many more? These are townhouses for senior citizens. And the number one thing people want is single story living. And it says, I mean, if you Google it, it'll tell you that's what people want to live in when they're older. That's what they want to downsize to. And I think we should try to offer that. That's why you have senior housing. Some of these condos in buildings, they're single level. So I think that the concerns that were identified by the consultant were done very well. So the first pages, consistency of zoning, and we want to do that. And I think the development community said we've got too much specificity. And I'm not disagreeing with it. But the question is, how do we get the product? Because we're not getting it. And if we don't, I'd like to find that balance. And I remember them talking about last week about 10-foot walkways for walking paths. Maybe 10 foot's too much. But right now, we're putting in... Sidewalks that people have to park on. So you have to put in something. So in finding that balance is what we're trying to do. And we identified when we started a couple of communities that we wanted in their larger communities, but Amble Brook and some that are done very nicely. And we have them here. We have some older ones, Carol Vista. We have Coventry up in Westminster. It's a beautiful community, high demand. So we have some examples of that. Now, how do we get that? Did Tonytown make them do it, or did Bob Ward just come in and say, I do these beautiful communities, which he does all over? Not everybody does that. And they have different motives for building these things. So on these concerns and directions, favorable. The question is, is the code that we're writing, is it aligned with it? And I know there's a lot of push to not have to go back the original these developments to five of them i'm going to tell you it's the land it's pretty much the only large land that we have left in the freedom district so you're basically going to build 800 some more houses of the same thing or 660 88 plus something else some they're already being built and all but 26 of them well our summer townhouses and if there's some there's about 200 condos which are the retirement home. But we're talking about the same product, same exact floor plan. I haven't seen all of them, but they're very much the same. So we're saying, OK, so do we go ahead and let all that happen just because the papers are done and it's inconvenient? And some of these projects were not this mature when this all started. And I'm not sure why it takes four and five years. One of the projects we're building now is 25 years old. And they've been going under a 25-year-old regime. It just keeps getting extended. And we've got to figure out that's not right either because things change in 25 years. So when people say they've been doing this for 20 years or 25 years, another one's 20 years. They're building it now. It's been there 20 years. And Planning Commission, I don't even remember seeing it because it's so old. That's not right either. So I don't know what we do about that. But we'd like to accelerate and make it easier. Time is money for the builders and developers. And they pass that cost on. They have to. So time is money for it goes into the cost of the home. And I appreciate that. So the scale and compatibility, all of the things in the consultant's analysis I agree with. The question becomes, how do we make it put into code? Aging in place, it tells you what the survey says. And I'll tell you, pretty much yes, most people, not everybody, but most everybody you talk to, this is what they are looking for. They want to be at age in place. They want a one-story home. They want accessible design. They want first floor living. They want it designed for long-term comfort. They want visitor parking, a little bit, garages, carports, parking near homes, wider doorways just in first floor, wide streets, affordability. As I said, what we're doing now is not affordable, because you're building all the space people don't need. You're building two more floors. It might be more affordable to jam it together and make it high, but it's actually less affordable than the ones that are being built other places that are single story, because you're building more square feet than you really are needed. So the affordability issue, I think we might end up even with things that are less expensive. I don't know. The market in our geographic area is higher just because land use is higher. So I agree with all those pages. The way we calculate yield, I still can't figure out how we calculate yield in these retirement homes. We can sit down and talk about that later. But the big issue about open space, green space, whatever you want to call it, I'm not talking about fancy open space. I am talking about having green grass between two houses. I'm talking about having a flat space to walk. I'm talking about grass. I'm not even talking about fanciness. Some of these projects are so overwhelmed with stormwater management. There's 22 of them at the one project for 129 houses, 22 or 23 stormwater. The whole thing is stormwater. And I understand that. And I'm like, how do they get this in other places? How do they get it more flat so people can actually walk their dog, if they have a dog, or walk flat? And they're not attractive. They're just dirt and stones. And I know you love stormwater, but I've seen pretty stormwater management ponds. So most of these folks in these higher density areas, they have to go underground. OK, I'm not sure. And I know we don't use a lot of underground in Carroll County. So how do we make sure that we have the usable space? Do we dictate it and say how many acres it should be? Or do we say just you need to go underground for your stormwater? Or many of the communities are using regional stormwater management ponds. And they're nice. They make them very nice. I just looked. Now I'm reading about NPDES. I looked at a neighborhood near where I was the other day. And there's this big new hole in the ground. And they had NPDES stormwater or whatever. And they're building houses around it. It's going to be this big pond. So I appreciate that we have to, but it's a regional pond. So how do we not take up this open space, which is all, and when I say stormwater management ponds, it's just dips and swirls, and I know it's in the eyes of the beholder, but most beholders are not as appreciative of the stormwater management pond as a stormwater person may be. So again, do we dictate how much must be usable, how much be this, or do we need to say, It's sort of net versus gross, like we were talking about. Clustering is going to come next. How do we make sure the land that is left, we're allowing the density, we're allowing to be pushed closer together, But it has to be something there. And when people buy these properties, they look at it. They see a piece of paper. They see a blank slate. They're going to build on lot one and lot two and lot three. And even when I visited down there back in the fall with Ms. Daly, she's looking on the map. Well, there's some space here and here and here. And we're like, hmm. It looks like a blue pond. There's no blue pond there. There is dirt. So when people are showed it, it looks like there's all these spaces. But those spaces are not functional. They're not functional to a human. they're functional to gather water so so using excuse me using maybe a better method we can say you have to have a certain amount I'm not sure the bet and maybe the community the business of the development community can explain to us what they'd rather do but most these developments they go underground and they have some underground for each of the

drip lines or and they also for roads they have like a regional like one or two that are nice that have something around them so if i may i can i can answer your questions so um related to storm water management requirements the state requires that you have these smaller distributed type systems so the days of building one regional facility we are not allowed to do that anymore by state law but um I believe we have addressed your concern regarding open space through the requirements that are in the proposed code, which are that 25% of the total area of the site needs to be open space. So no roads, no buildings, et cetera. And of that, half of that is allowed to be environmental features and stormwater, but the other half cannot be. So you're talking about 12.5% of the site needs to be the open grass type areas where people can walk and so on. And then we have the additional requirement that an additional of that 10% of the requirement needs to be suitable for active open space. So flatter where you can have whatever amenity that the community may want to have there. A flat open area for a gazebo to be built or a pickleball corridor or something along those lines. So I believe we've addressed your concern there regarding open space because currently the county does not have any code requirements for open space on these types of projects so then you're left with the default you're left with the default of the open space of environmental features where you can't build anyways and then you have the open space where the stormwater management facilities are located so that's our current code but I think we've addressed your concern by making that requirement of a percentage of the overall site needs to be open and usable

And the reason I don't think that's adequate is because that thing might be over here. These people want to be able to walk out of their house. They want to be able to walk out their back door. They can't. It's down into a grate. And again, I go to these other communities, I don't see that anywhere. So why not be able to go underground? even on even on regular communities they're putting stuff underground so that they have flat yards keep in mind this is a recommendation from the Planning Commission and the Board of County Commissioners through your work sessions can certainly make that change and make that what I'm suggesting is that we do get less maybe less specific on this parcel that because it might be down the road somebody just wants to walk out of their house and walk around it So I think looking at how we do stormwater for these very dense communities, and then also, what do we count as buildable space? And I won't go through it here, but it's sort of like clustering. First of all, no townhouses, as far as I'm concerned, in our code anywhere does it say you can build townhouses in R, 40, 20, or 10. Questionable could in a minute. I would say I wouldn't mind having a mix in a ten but That's even right now. It's not allowed It's it's if you read the ordinance and that's it's being approved again I don't know how it's being interpreted because I don't interpret that that was not the intention of the Planning Department even back then it somehow got interpreted that way So again, I'm not trying to change the rules. I'm trying to say the rules have been interpreted in not the correct way, and we're not getting the product out of it. If they were being interpreted correctly, we'd be getting the product we need. We'd be getting these small single family, I would call them cottage style or villas or something. We'd be getting the kind of product we want. There wouldn't be a lot of extra space up and down that are really eventually not going to be usable. Some of these people, they move in when they're younger, 55. Some communities, they limit it to 62, so they're a little older. But most of these people still work. They're in and out. 55, you're working until you're 65, so you're on Medicare. But they want to be able to stay there longer. So we have examples. I think that it can be done. So they're a big issue about how do we get true, and it's not open space fancy, and then how do we make sure there are no townhouses and we get mostly single for a living. And they've done that in different types of floor plans. There's different types of families. Some might be at one person. Some might be three people. Some might be two. They want some options. Right now, they're all very much the same. So that's just some of the fundamentals. And how do we get there is the question.

If I may, Commissioner Krebs, I do want to focus a little bit on where we are in that process and how we get to where we want to go. Again, what's before us today is whether to send these to a public hearing. They're gonna come back to us for approval as a board But I think that we are hearing some notions of things that we might want to change we might want to amend Just to clarify for everybody watching at what point does that trigger or does that trigger these to return to the public? excuse me the the Planning and Zoning Commission is it and that's what I want people to understand as we're going through this because I I'm trying to pick up on where the fellow commissioners are with things that they might want to change.

And I'm just on the big things.

Okay, because I know you're mentioning stormwater management and some other things, but I want to try to get to some tangibles. If we're gonna change things and we're gonna have a conversation about it here before the public hearing, I think it's important to try to figure out what those tangible changes might be.

I guess the stormwater management is how do we get what we need to do to be compliant and still have a development that has some integrity to it, that has some green grass, that has some walkable space next to the homes, next to the 18 in a row, down the row, 10 foot apart. Even that's got a dip in it. I think you have to see it to understand what we're trying to fix. And I think people that move in these homes, they don't realize it. And then the next thing is affordability and who takes care of it. And we're going to talk about this in clustering as well. These all sound good, but now the easements for this all gets sent to the homeowner association. And they've got to now maintain them. They now have to maintain the roads. They now have to maintain. And that's not really made clear, because that's not what normally is done. And it seems like in some developments, the county takes it over. But in some of these developments, they're taking care of it. So they now, this homeowner association, Some of them have 48 houses. Some have 30 houses. Some have 100 houses. They now have to maintain stormwater management. Well, there's costs to that. And we're talking about affordability. And some of the costs on these things, one of them was $511 a month. That's a lot. And they don't have any amenities. They have no amenities at all, except they now have to take care of all these things. So I think we've got to, when we talk about affordability, make sure we understand what we're putting on these homeowners. How do they know what to do? How does the board know? Are they supposed to learn about all this? Do they know it when they move in? They didn't. So how do we make sure that stuff is clear? What you're going to be responsible for. And it's something I know in my development. We have 13 houses. We're in a subdivision. And we all own our own land. And we put up a sign. Charge people $100 once. Like 15 years later, went back and asked for $50 more. And one of the people didn't pay the $50, and someone else did eat the $50, because they didn't want to pay the $50 to maintain the sign. So you're talking about a homeowner association now of people that have to take care of all of this. and so just keep that in mind and they're sitting there going what did i get into here and oh now you're all responsible because you all own it it and they're not getting a benefit it's not like they have a nice robust set of um a pool or whatever they're just stormwater management ponds so just keep that in mind of the cost i'm going to mention that during clustering with the value they're getting out of it and what in some communities it seems like the easement goes back to the county and some it seems like they're taking care of it and i'm not sure if down the road that's going to not be problematic so Just put that on your radar screen. The other issue on safety is these fire lanes. And I know Westminster, in their code, it says 30-foot roads, 50-foot easement. Clear. No difference between a site plan and a subdivision plan. And I know that it was just mentioned that there's lots of developments that are not like that. But just because something isn't right before from many years ago when we didn't have, people used to, have one car they'd hoist some buggy when some of these towns were made that doesn't mean now that we people all drive that we don't change things otherwise we would never improve anything so we can't go back and change the past but we can we can look at where we are and i can tell you after being over there every time i've visited this one community there are people parking on the sidewalks there because there's nowhere else to park and to count two spots in the drive in the garage which is undersized you cannot open your door on a regular size car and get out These people might be handicapped at some point or using a walker. You can't open the doors and get out. So a garage is not a garage. And some of the houses that are being built, in the middles, they're only putting a single garage with a single driveway. And then some of the ones in the middles in development, they're actually putting double driveways that are just all connected path. So we haven't really identified that. They're not all double car garage. They're not even of the. So you don't want to get into details, but that's what we're getting. That's what's happening on the ground. And the one community I'm talking about, 48 homes, they have four extra parking spots. Some of the houses have one car garage and one driveway. And there's no parking. I mean, there's no, the roads are 20 feet. So it's just, and then you get there and say, how did this happen? So I do believe that we need to make, in these tight developments, We should be making a road requirements. If you make your road 24 feet, you could have parking on one side and you can clearly indicate where your parking is. And then if you want to maybe if you do park on one side, you don't need any extra parking spots because you take care of it. And if you do parking on both sides, you're really great shape. But I don't think having 20 and leaving it up to the homeowner association to figure out how many extra spots you need and and making sure they put no parking signs up. I know we don't want the curbs painted. I wouldn't want the curbs painted, but you have to have the parking. And so I don't like in this retirement community only saying the clearance of 20 feet and then expect the homeowner association to police that. I've been told by some police officers in Howard County, they're not allowed to go on the site plan and give tickets. I don't know if that's true because it's private property. So it's not reasonable to think there's a new parking sign, but nobody can enforce it, and the board's going to enforce it. It's just unreasonable. Make the road wide enough. So I would encourage us to figure out how to do that, and it would take up how far the spots are away. Because the one issue, and these are a lot of small things, but on some of the smaller communities, I want to make sure the underlying land use is consistent with the adjacent communities. And that is all the way through the master plan. And that's why the land use was consistent. So if something is single family homes, they're on small lots, they might be fifth acre. They're consistent. But they're the same type of home. So I want to make sure we go back to that. And that means these projects are going to have to go back to the drawing board, at least several of them, because they are all townhouses. Some have a couple of single family. And they do it in different communities. I mean, the same developer, they build these communities up in, they have the models. They're nice. We just want to have those same things here in Carroll County as well. On the maximum allowable building width, again, the townhouses, to me, should be off of these properties. But even where we do allow them, having a maximum building width of a smaller amount, it gives you the opportunity to make communities that aren't just straight lines of 18 houses. If you do like three, you can put three here, and you put three here, and you put them on a circle, and they're nicely done. And again, I'm turning into a I think when I was a kid, I wanted to be an exterior designer. I wanted to design things. And I think designing a nice community might be in my next wheeled house here. The sidewalks, we can get into talking about some of these things. I think some of it is the 10 feet wide. I heard one of the developers say, let us design what our designers want to do. And some of them have great designers, and some don't. you know 10 foot wide dictating that if for a it might be might be too much a shared youth pathway and if they want to do it certainly they can but these sidewalks of five feet is for sure the other thing i want to ask about is the mountable curbs versus the regular curb and gutter the mountable curbs is what allows people to be able to have to park up on the sidewalk why do we choose a mountable curve versus a curbing gutter

So both mountable and vertical are both considered curb and gutter. And then it's a preference as to whether you want vertical curbs or not. So it's not a requirement. We allow both. When you have roadways with a larger capacity, like more vehicles going on them, and and in theory then higher speeds you would not want to have the mountable curbs especially with sidewalks adjacent because you want some minor level of protection uh for pedestrians adjacent to it but that's just one minor i'm just thinking in these very dense communities it might be better to do a regular curb and that's only because it forces that you cannot then go up on the curb but we also have to have adequate parking and we're getting to um the amenity report

A lot of time was spent by the Planning Commission and the developers talking about the amenity report. That's a marketing issue, and you give them the density so they can have amenities. I'm not going to sit and dictate amenities. What I would like to dictate is that they have to have a certain amount of space. And one of the things they talk about with people, they like air, they like light. I mean, having light in a room for people is very important, especially when you're older. They used to not build schools with windows, and whoever thought of that, now they've gone back and we put windows everywhere, because light is healthy for people. And then on the retirement homes, we did not talk much about that. So on the retirement homes, the one thing that most of them have is a basic gathering area. I know the one up at Liberty Place does not have even one room set aside. So they have to actually go rent a place to have their community meetings. It seems like, I'm not sure we dictate it, but I want to understand when you do a home, what's the density bonus? Because to me, all this is about we're giving extra. We're giving extra allowance for building things closer so there's less infrastructure, not more yield, because we've been told over and over there's no more yield, which I think when you lay this out properly, there is more yield. So when these homes, are they getting more yield? Let's say they're on commercial one or two. Is there more yield coming out of what they could have put there?

I think there is clearly more. There are more. yield for your to use your word, when it's a retirement home or retirement community, where that distinction is not where it's the same is only on clustering. These are not considered clustered developments in the same sense. So so Yes, there is definitely. Everyone, I think, agrees that you get more yield.

Well, the way it's written, you get on R20 right now, if you were just building regular homes, you could get two houses on one lot, one acre, two houses, R20. Right now you can get 3.5 the way it's written on a retirement home. But that's not on one acre. They're putting it on one acre and using the rest as open space. So that's the problem is that they're getting like 10 on an acre, not 3.5. So it's not a literal... That yield, the way it's being considered when somebody reads 3.5, you're thinking, okay, it's X, Y. You're getting instead of 2, you're getting 4 or 3.5, but you're not. You're really getting like 10 because you're using a whole bunch of space in the stream bed to – it's unbuildable to count for – that that I guess you're using average and that that's not read anywhere where it says the word average so just I'm just bringing these things up so you know you know how this is calculated is meaningful and then on the retirement homes I just want to ask about the gathering area we didn't there wasn't much talk about gathering area it seems like depending on what we've given back if they were building a regular market apartment building or condo building what would their yield be able to be and is this any different and if we're not given any bonus density I think bonus extra density because it's called retirement home then we shouldn't require anything and and I would remind you that remind everybody that You can build a retirement home without doing it under this regime. You can build a retirement community, I'm sorry, a retirement community or a retirement village without calling it that. So Coventry up in Westminster was done under a clustering regime on R20.

Yes.

They just decided to cluster. And they're very nicely done. They've got sidewalks. They don't have other amenities. But they'll have a little backyard, so they can have a little garden if they want. There's stormwaters out of the way. They have nice circles in the middle, so they have flowers that they take care of. They have all their grass cut. So it's an idea of a smaller community. And that's what they want. That's all they really want. They love it. It's very popular. So anybody can do a retirement community. They just put it in their covenants. It doesn't have to go in their deed. For us, it should go in the deed, because we've given something back in return. But if you want to do a 55 community, put it in your covenants. And then someday, if they want to get out of it, they have to put in there. We could have a vote of a certain number of people. 20 years from now in Florida, they're getting rid of some of it. If it's just in their covenants, they can turn it back into something else. But if we're giving them bonus density upfront, it should be in the deed. Because you've agreed to this. You're getting extra density. I have it as a retirement home. So they're all little nuances. And as I've said before, this is a sophisticated product. And we haven't treated it as that a few years ago. None of these things were really discussed. And we're getting not a good product out of it. And so I think I would be happy. We don't even have to have a work session. We can just have the interested parties have a work session and work through this. Because I know in your areas, your own towns do this and I appreciate that so if you don't want to participate in the details of this but I recommend that we two things the public hearing is for September 3rd during this meeting I've asked many times people in my district would like to have a meeting in the evening That's when they meet. We're going to have an evening meeting for the road in Westminster, which I appreciate. I will be there. I'd like to have an evening meeting for this as well, because that's when people, they work. People in my district work. That's why they pay their taxes, so we can afford all this stuff. So evening meeting, we can either do it the first or the second. If possible, I'd like to do it where it's convenient for them. The senior center seems to work for everybody. If that's possible, we have a lot of people show up when we advertise and have it there. Obviously, when we do things here in these meetings, every meeting, no one comments no one weighs in and that to me is not it's not accessible so I'm asking for that and and then that would be either September 1st or 2nd which is the two days before the 3rd and then and that way they wouldn't have to sit through this long meeting and sit here and it's it's more it's easier to do instead of having the public hearing during this meeting on the 3rd

So that's, um, I don't know if we're gonna come to a consensus on that particular time and date. But that is something that a word will have to agree on where when and where the meeting is going to take place on September 3. Oh, absolutely.

Yeah, we're separate. No, I thought you

So we'll have to drill down that. I know you have mentioned already that you'd like to see a change to that. So I'm going to insist that we move the discussion along still. The question before us is still whether we send these proposed tax amendments to a public hearing. And like you mentioned, Commissioner Krebs, we'll have to have a discussion with the when and where and reach board consensus on that.

The only reason I'm bringing some of this stuff up is I want to make it clear where I am on this. Sure. There's some big things and there's some little things, but the bigger issues, and I got my letter still from the fire department, this is not negotiable.

Sure. Thank you, Commissioner Krebs. Again, there's been a lot of work on this. This has been a, and the format you've put it in is, you know, from my own experience, sitting up here and on the Planning and Zoning Commission, it's about as easy to understand as you can possibly get, because these things are never simple. So, again, I want to reiterate, we've got a motion, not a motion, but we've got a potential motion in front of us to do anything.

yeah I make a motion that we have a public hearing on the motion just read the motion in the I'm trying to find it I turned the page first page it's at the beginning of it I make a motion that we direct staff to schedule a public hearing regarding the proposed amendments to the county code changes in chapter 155 and 158 related related to retirement homes and communities. Did I say that right? No. Wrong page.

We want to make a motion to direct staff to schedule a public hearing for the proposed tax amendments to county code related to age-restricted communities and homes.

OK.

That's the motion.

I think we said the beginning to schedule a public hearing for proposed tax amendments to county code related to age restricted communities and homes. And I would ask for that to be on a week night, either September 1st or September 2nd, if that works.

Can we do the two things separately?

There's a motion. I don't know if I can make a motion or a second for that particular motion.

So how far did it go? Were we specifying the night?

Commissioner Krebs in her motion has specified the place and time. And I'm waiting for a second of that particular motion, which is slightly different from.

Right now it's scheduled for the third during the day here.

It's not scheduled at all for location or time other than the third.

I know. We're going to work through this. So we have a motion including a date and time. Do we have a second? OK, that motion fails. Commissioner Krebs, would you like to?

Well, I guess I'm trying to figure out. I supported having Westminster's motion. They're hearing at night, and we've talked about this. I'm trying to figure out why we can't have ours at night.

OK, well, again, I think. Can we just make a motion to do the public hearing? Yeah, thank you, Ms. Windham.

Yeah, we're getting there. We're getting there. If I might, I have no issue with this being an evening meeting. But as Commissioner Guerin stated a few minutes ago, that was something we wanted to collectively discuss. Because whether, and I realize this pertains heavily to D5, But this also does play out through the entire county code, as staff has said. So to me, I think it would only be proper and judicious that we collectively, which we're missing one of our members today, discuss that and pick that date later. I don't think anybody's suggesting we don't have a meeting. I have no issue with there being a night meeting. But at this moment, I would rather we just move forward with the motion being I move the Board of County Commissioners directly.

I already made a motion.

Well, the motion wasn't seconded, however. to schedule a public hearing for proposed text amendments to county code to age-restricted communities and homes.

Okay, we do have a motion. Second. We do have two seconds. Any further discussion or comments? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Okay, the motion passes unanimously. Yes, sir.

I'd like to make a motion, and in Commissioner Vigliotti's absence, because I know it was important to him, I think the public hearing should be scheduled in this building on a weeknight that best suits the commissioner's schedule. I don't want to specify what night of the week, but that week, I don't care if it's Thursday night. Hopefully we're not still in this meeting Thursday night. but that's a motion I'd like to make it be in this building I think when we get to the the freedom plans and and that stuff it's appropriate it be in eldersburg but I think the Tonytown people the Manchester Hampstead people they they need to have it at a convenient location also so that's my motion it'd be on a weeknight here

OK. So we have a motion that the public hearing for this particular proposed tax amendment occurs here at the county office building during a weeknight. Is there a second of that motion at this time?

Second.

There is a second.

I just want to mention, I believe

Any further discussion on that?

I believe that I'm right. These projects, because they have to be on water and sewer, only affect the unincorporated area of freedom, because they're the only ones on water and sewer that could have these projects. So I don't think they can happen in the other parts of the county, except in the towns, which they have their meeting locally. And I'm very happy that they are able to do that. But I think all the other growth areas have their meetings locally, because it only affects them. I don't think these can be built anywhere else because there's not water and sewer except in the Freedom District. So is that? Not necessarily. Unless they put in their own packaging plan or something.

Yes, they would have to address water and septic. But for example, Westminster Mews is outside of the city of Westminster. I believe they run public water and sewer, but they're in the county. So it could get.

but it affects 95% would be and we've had what I'm trying to get when I look for I don't like it when it says nobody weighed in and nobody commented because to me we're not getting to the people when we have the things there for the people that it affects we have a ton of people there and that's what we want we want feedback I want participation I want community participation and that's where we've had it for this these particular issues so I would like to respectfully ask you to reject that and stick with me and just this one time that people don't want to go they don't have to go

So we're still on a discussion about the motion that sets the location in general time for the public hearing. Since we are in a discussion, I would not vote favorably on that motion at this point, only because I'd like to give all of us our opportunity to check our schedules, make sure we're going to be available.

I said at a night that meets the commissioner's schedule. That was part of the motion. Yep.

understand and and and for me personally I completely understand why we would want to have it here because it is a countywide but I at this time I would I would vote no on the motion just because I want to make sure that we're all given opportunity to check our schedules so do we have okay so all in favor of the motion all right opposed no no do we do have it on the schedule here right on the next steps is September 3rd public hearing board leaves record for

That's our rule. No, I know. But I'm just saying that's a Thursday. Whether it's day or night, it's up.

And schedules for that night have already been checked.

So the motion did not pass, but we will have to come up with a consensus on that sooner rather than later.

And the only reason I mentioned that date, we could do it sooner.

No, you can't.

Oh, we've got to have 10 days, whatever the time frame is. I know it's a very short time frame. I was trying to find something that was close to this date.

You can't do it sooner because of advertising restrictions.

So we're going to move on. OK. Thank you for all of that. We're going to move on to the next item, a briefing, discussion, or decision regarding cluster subdivisions.

You can stay there and drive if you like. Sure. All right. So moving on to cluster subdivisions. As a reminder of what we're talking about with cluster subdivisions, cluster subdivisions are a development, a subdivision, method. Typically, you've got conventional, where you have the more distributed, as you see on the image on the left. And cluster subdivisions, you cluster the properties, the buildings, the houses in the more buildable areas. And the purpose of that is that you can retain larger areas of environmental features, so you're not disturbing those. It reduced costs, and so on and so forth. And we have a definition of cluster there from the Freedom Community Comprehensive Plan for your reference. We have been discussing cluster subdivisions for quite a time now. And back in the fall of last year, the Board of County Commissioners raised some issues and concerns regarding cluster subdivisions. And I've noted them here. Currently, we're working on kind of two parallel paths for addressing these. The consulting firm of Michael Baker International was hired by the county to work on various land uses. We've discussed age-restricted and then also self-service storage, on-plant commercial centers, and also cluster. They are actively working on the cluster subdivision codes that the county has and coming up with recommendations and we'll be bringing those back to the board in the future as part of a presentation similar to the other types of uses that we've discussed. In the meantime, however, we did discuss about a month or so ago, maybe two months ago, that there were some higher level concerns that the board had related to code changes that were made back in 2022, and whether some of those higher level concerns we wanted to roll those back to prior to what were put in place in 2022. And as those were relatively simple, high-level concerns, we took those to the Planning and Zoning Commission as directed by the board to discuss. So for your reference, we have the code as it was in 1993, and we also have the current code, which has the highlights of what was changed in 2022. And I have those outlined, and they're basically four changes that occurred in 2022. The first one is related to determining the amount of density of the number of lots that can be constructed. Prior to 2022, the county required that the developer produce a conventional plan basically laying out a regular conventional plan to determine how many lots they could achieve on that property that then set the maximum number of of units that could be shown on a cluster plan Over the years, working with developers in the Planning and Zoning Commission, we recognized that that additional step of producing the conventional plan was an additional expense for the developers and took additional time and really did not produce a different result. And so after much discussion with the Planning and Zoning Commission and with the Board of County Commissioners, we revised county code that the conventional plan was no longer required. That was a change in 2022. We also addressed minimum lot size. Prior to 2022, there was no lower limit on how much the lots could be reduced in size. If you had R40 zoning, which has a minimum of 40,000 square feet, if you clustered, there was no lower limit to how small the lots could get. So in 2022, we recommended that we set a limit, which is essentially half of what the underlying zoning would allow. So a 40,000 square foot lot could be reduced down to 20,000 square feet. The third change was the minimum parcel size that would allow for cluster subdivision. Prior to 2022, you had to have at least 10 acres. We recommended that cluster subdivision be allowed for less than 10 acres. And to accommodate some of the requirements regarding open space, we put in the provision that the Planning and Zoning Commission could waive some of the open space requirements. And then the fourth item was related to we just added in a provision to the code that when a cluster subdivision is proposed that it had to utilize all of the potential yield. You couldn't develop half of a parcel and save yield for something else in the future. So we reviewed all four of these proposals with the Planning and Zoning Commission, had some discussion about them and the end result was the Planning Commission recommended that these codes not be changed at this time. It's also recognized that again, we have Michael Baker is currently working on a higher level review of all of the cluster codes and those will be brought back before the board and and presumably for discussion again with the Planning and Zoning Commission to delve into these, all of the codes in more detail. There was one recommendation, one request by the board that was not part of this, and that was to look at situations when there is a defined benefit related to a cluster development. and how the Board of County Commissioners could potentially vary or waive some of these cluster requirements when there was this defined benefit. And so what we came up with as a recommendation was to accomplish this as part of a development rights and responsibilities agreement. which is our Chapter 161 in the county code. What we recommended to the Planning Commission for consideration and the Planning Commission supported this amendment was a statement that the Board of County Commissioners may, through a development rights and responsibilities agreement pursuant to Chapter 161, vary the requirements to open space density and a minimum lot size. So that's the provision. But if you remember from the DRAs, there is a limit that you have to have at least 125 lots for consideration of a DRA. And so we added in notwithstanding that section. So it gets rid of that provision. So basically, any size, number of lot, size, subdivision, if there is a benefit to the county and this would be entirely determined by the board of county commissioners that we could enter into a drra that would recognize that community benefit and lay out the rights and responsibilities of the developer and the county And the Board of County Commissioners only could waive some of those requirements or vary some of those requirements to open space density and minimum lot size. And so that's the text that we came up with to meet the request from the commissioners. And the Planning and Zoning Commission did support that amendment. So happy to answer any questions or any further discussion.

so that case the exception if the county could acquire a portion of the site close to half do regional stormwater management do a park let somebody farm it offer it to CCPS as a potential potential school site that would consider being a thing, even if we just did the regional stormwater management, let somebody farm the rest or whatever.

Yes, and that would be entirely at the determination of the Board of County Commissioners, that if you feel that there's a community benefit to that sort of agreement that would convey property to the county and in return for that, the Board of County Commissioners could vary different requirements per the cluster code.

So we would have to approve the developer agreement? Yes.

yes absolutely okay so this this would allow us that option it doesn't make us do it correct okay gotcha yes and the current code doesn't allow you that option unless they're a significant number of homes yes before we continue i want to ensure that we do we have any public comment uh here or online mr swam

I have no one on line, sir. All right, excellent.

I will- You have a question? Go ahead, Commissioner Krause.

All right, so you said the DRA, why was there put a limit of 125?

Yeah, so that limit was put in. It's a pretty standard limit that other jurisdictions have put in place, maybe not that number. But we just wanted to prevent the occurrence that every residential subdivision would apply to the county for DRRA and start that whole process. So we wanted it to be a consequential size of development that we would want to enter into those discussions.

So if we... It seems to me with our current code, because it doesn't have much specificity, that I'd almost rather have it on everything just because there's so much leeway that people can't depend on. But if we do it more structured and people can depend on it, maybe that would be true. But we don't have that many projects that are that large. And it seems to me it'd be nice to have an agreement of facts early on for everybody so they know this is what we expect. Right now we wait so long till the end of the process for, agreement on roads, and then they're all the way through the process, and we're like, well, what about this? And then it doesn't happen. So I think for us, for Carol, since we don't have many projects that have 125 lots, I think it could be beneficial to have it for less amount of lots, even 50. And if the developer wants to get that stuff locked down ahead of time, it would be better than waiting. Because what I keep hearing is we've got all this time and all this money, and we don't tell them what they have to do until the very end. for some of the APFO issues. And I wouldn't want to find out at the end. I'd like to know at the beginning. And on the one project that we just are finishing up, they clearly were supposed to do something. They built the entire community, haven't done it, and it's never going to happen. And that's not fair either for the community. So we want to make sure both are protected earlier in the process with the APFO. And maybe the developer wants to get it requested. I mean, I'm not sure. it would solidify what you're asking them to do earlier in the process, and they could request it. Because right now, with this complete application, to me, a complete application is not until your APFO is settled and really settled. And how do you really settle it? It really should be in a written agreement, not just, oh, I said this and I said that. because that's that has not done us well in the past because we're not getting the mitigations they're not getting completed so I'm not sure we can talk about that later but I just would like to have those discussions up front instead of saying oh no you can't you can't make them you do this now and it all changes but I just wanted to read you something that and this is I got a lot of my information from someone that I very much respect in planning Back a long time ago, and I found this a long time ago, one of our visionary planners that helped plan the whole area many, many years ago, but we were talking about clustering. This is back in 2017. To incentivize the increase of density, a cluster proposal in the R20 as a permitted use in a long-established residential zone of lesser density, And avoid proposing the changing of the zone rezoning is, in my view, disingenuous. It could well be destabilizing to an established neighborhood. And unlike a conditional use in zone, there's no formal notice, no formal public hearing before the BZA, rather a ministerial option of the land developer. Even an overlay zone typically requires a public hearing on the merits before it drops down to the underlying zoning district. Overlaying zones typically require legislative approval. After a public hearing by the commissioners in Carol's case, and in my view, this option bastardizes the integrity of the current zone as to its single family residential density characteristic. And then the question becomes, and he says, what's the study purpose on the impetus? So I always say, why are we doing it? What's the purpose? What's the purpose of clustering? It's something that we've been doing. I agree with it in ag, and I agree with it in conservation. Because there are large lots, and their minimum is an acre. But when we're talking about changing something from a half an acre, most of Carroll County is a half an acre. I mean, you look at maps everywhere. It's enough for a house and a little bit of space around it. They're very stable neighborhoods, and that's why people move here. And so the clustering allows you to take it down to half of that, and before that, even less than that. And you're taking these big houses and jamming them together, and then you're leaving a bunch of grass over here, What's the benefit to the community? So I guess we say what is the purpose of the clustering for each one? What's the benefit? And then I've been reading a lot about homeowner fees. That's why I keep bringing it up. I've got like four or five articles here about the surging cost of homeowner fees. And we keep talking about affordability. Some people are paying more in HOA or condo fees. This is Wall Street Journal. and insurance and property taxes than they are for their interest on their mortgage. People are paying more than ever to homeowners associations, adding to their monthly costs that drive many buyers out of the housing market. This is in addition to the rising homeowner costs. so I can read this I've got several other articles more local but again all these things then when you push it off on the homeowner association it's like what value are they getting out of it and sometimes they are I mean sometimes it's trash pickup they're getting a value so I guess on this I'm looking back at what the A esteemed planner told me years ago about it, because I like to run it by someone knowledgeable. And I do think the underlying zoning is what people, that's what you go to your master plan for. It's predictability for the person that buys something. So when you have a process that really minimizes the lot size in half, um by the zoning district you're and to what end so that's why what's the purpose and years ago we had some communities that really did a nice job with it they maybe take it down from a half to a third and they put a playground over here or a walking path in and it was a benefit to the community they were more modest sized houses back then so they didn't take the whole now you've got larger homes and And they're really taking up the whole lot, and they're right next to each other. So I'd like to make sure we understand what is the purpose about this lot yield. I want to do, to me, counting stormwater management pond. If it was an attractive one with a fountain in it, maybe you could count it. But that's not an environmental benefit. It's not the way it was described in the master plan. It's not described in our definition of what open space is. So I go back to that. I'm not trying to make new ground here. I'm trying to say, how do we comply with what people called open space in the master plan, what our definition says, and that's what we're going to call it. We're not going to call all these other things open space when they're not. So you have to deduct out. certain things if it's unbuildable when you buy a piece of property 100 acres and if you've got a big stream down the middle and you've got a big rock cliff um you can't build on it that's what you bought and to now say oh this was our whatever i could build this many houses now i can build twice as many i'm going to jumble them all over here but that's not what this is about that that's So that's the intention of what cluster means. Frederick County has the net. I think we talked about that during our work session. Their code is very nicely written out. So I think we should use some type of net. But then also, what is the benefit to the community, and what's the cost? Because right now, we're putting some of their their clustered area in an easement. It might have a bunch of trees on it. It's not necessarily forested. We're putting their stormwater management in an easement. And they now have to pay for it. And some of these cluster developments, we're putting the roads now that they're responsible for. And I know it saves the county money, but I don't really think that it's fair. That just because, hey, I bought on a site plan, and I really don't get any benefit on any of this stuff, I now have to take care of my roads, and I'm still paying all these taxes. So again, if it's something that you have all this stuff on a site, and it's going to be one of these planned communities that has a million things, it's a planned unit development. But on this particular...

Can I ask a question? Isn't that what this suggestion is supposed to take care of? No, I'm just... I mean, if... Maybe I misunderstand the suggestion. That's why I'm asking, if you don't mind. Because I'm confused. I usually figure other people are confused, too. The... creating a DRRA with a developer who's interested in a cluster subdivision those kinds of concerns that Commissioner Krebs is raising would be negotiated through that through that DRRA process right when if the Board of County Commissioners determines that there's a significant community benefit for that particular subdivision then a DRRA could be initiated and put in place that would define all of those things Right.

Yes.

So if I'm just developer A and I come in with a with a cluster subdivision after this, let's say this past. OK, just to keep it simple.

Are there cluster subdivisions that the county doesn't take over the road?

mm-hmm no they have one now yeah i didn't think that we do we have one it's the new one up on oklahoma roads 13 houses cluster but the count it's going to be a county road yeah yeah the county takes overall that's the one that's the news is we take maybe half the rights yeah yeah so so um yes as when it's a subdivision the purpose of a subdivision is to create individual lots and that's what this is about individual lots that can convey to private property owners the public infrastructure, so roads, utilities, and Carroll County is a little bit unique in the state in that we take over ownership of stormwater management facilities that are in subdivisions. because we found historically and this was we did this decades ago and it saved the county's millions and millions of dollars that we did this we do not allow hoas to own stormwater management facilities the county takes over ownership of them so those would not be part of an hoa fee in a cluster subdivision now if it's on a site where it's a corporation that owns that site and and such as the age restricted which we talked about before Because that's a corporation, then the corporation owns the stormwater management facilities and they're responsible for them. But the county takes over roads, utilities, and stormwater management facilities in a cluster subdivision.

So could we on the commissioner color does that yeah yeah I thought I was hearing that okay the homeowner Association had to maintain right and I knew that wasn't true okay and then on the site plan if I may finish my so so if if if I came to the county this

this code section got passed and i came to the county with a you know 50 lot cluster subdivision proposal and i said i'm going to have a significant benefit for the county and so therefore i want a cluster I'd have to go through a negotiation process with the county commissioners for a DRA so that they saw many of the things that Commissioner Krebs is mentioning, that there is what the board at that time considers a significant benefit.

And that's the first step in the process. Yes.

If they choose to go that way. They would want to do that very early on because they wouldn't want to move forward with some assumptions on how the county would view the project. Yes.

Yeah, I've never said this out loud, but you make sense.

So hopefully that resolves a lot of your concerns. So this would be this would be the first step, basically, and it would be addressing all those all those issues.

you mentioned benefit I don't know if you misspoke but you said benefit the county you mean benefit the community county residents well to me it should benefit that people that are again the underlying land use was x the people around it you know expected that just like this would be something the board of county commissioners would be negotiating with the developer so honestly

I don't it will be whatever board that I mean, unless it changes again, what if this were to pass, whatever board is sitting at that time would be the one determining what that benefit is.

If if they did that process. Yes. How many? Public comment chances would they have during that process?

So our chapter 161, which is the DRA code, lays out the entire process for acceptance of the DRA. So I'm going to go by memory here. But there are opportunities. So all discussions, negotiations are required to be an open session. So there are no closed door discussions with a developer. They would have to be an open session. And then the agreement goes to the Planning and Zoning Commission. to ensure that it's consistent with the master plan and that of course is an open meeting an open session and they can provide comment and recommendations and then i believe the final adoption or improvement of the dra also has to be an open session so there may be a public hearing notice requirement but i can't remember for sure yeah i think there is so there's multiple multiple opportunities for public input yes well what i'm trying to say is i think my original conversation about

the underlying land use. It's the master plan. We make a little exception saying if it benefits that community. And I'm talking about the community of that property. If there's a benefit to that community of clustering closer together that they would be able to take advantage of, then you're still honoring the underlying land use. But if you're going to benefit, you could just say, I'm going to put a regional stormwater management pond. I'm going to now. You're still violating the basic principle of the underlying land use of what it was meant to be. So I guess that's what I think it destabilizes. If you can change something and say, oh, I big stormwater management pond it's going to benefit the community benefit the county that's not in the in the it's not with the reason the clustering it was always to benefit the community that it served so it's a big change from that i do not suggest that that's the way we want to go if it benefits that particular community and again benefit is in the eyes of the beholder of what it used to be. And you can read other counties what they, it's a benefit of something that they would use. And when I mentioned the road before, the thing I'm remembering about that project is that the road goes down to a circle and then it has five long flag lots off of it that go up to homes. And I said, well, now we've got more impervious surface because you've got five lots And if that driveway had gone down further, we could have eliminated a lot of impervious surface, and they wouldn't have had to maintain these long driveways that are at the end of this court. And I think there was a comment made last year that it would save the county some plowing money. adding five more long driveways to an end of a court is not really the benefit it could have been if you now moved the it's i forget the name of the project but i just mineral hill yes mineral you know i'm saying that if you move that court and i've seen it now in place i'm thinking gosh these long driveways we've got five now big long impervious driveways that now these people all have to take care of that and if you've just taken the one down you could have And they all come from the same spot. It's not like they're coming off the back. They're just things to look at down the road, because it adds cost to those homeowners. And I just want to make sure that on this, the reason for clustering, again, the purpose, and Michael Baker hopefully will come up, what's the purpose of this? Let's go back to the underlying. you know i i definitely agree with what um former planner said about about what the expectations should be and there should be some validity to what an underlying land use is and what it means and you shouldn't just like throw it out the window but there's also some opportunities for um to do some good things with the space. But it may not be. They might just have to do conventional, and then they don't have any homeowner fees. And then they'll have to worry about their covenants. And you're adding a level of bureaucracy on these homeowner fees. Believe me, whether it's 10 people. So it might start off their own enthusiastic.

It's because it's clustered. It doesn't have to have a homeowners association, does it?

Well, you're giving some kind of, yes, because you have to mow the grass. Well, no, everyone that we've been done, they have a homeowner association. And they've got to mow unusable grass. I don't know.

I was just asking. Because you're creating open space, somebody is responsible for that. It might not be a benefit. Open space, it depends on what it is and what the level of maintenance associated with it would be.

And I can picture one that I think, OK, they put half acre lots on one fifth, and then these big, big two fields in the front. Can you picture that? And I would have rather had my little house be on the half an acre, this big house, instead of having these two big fields on the front that we now have to pay to mow. It just wasn't really a benefit.

So I don't think, I don't want to. go backwards too much but I know we keep talking about what's the benefit and what's the cost basis for homeowners fees and such I just want to mention one thing and I should have mentioned it earlier on the last item we keep talking about HOA fees we talk about amenities and at the last planning and zoning meeting one of the things that kept coming up was do they want a pickleball court or do they would they rather go to x entity and i think the one thing we need to be very cognizant of and of course it's not up to us it's up to the parties that buy these uh homes is what do they want because a lot of what the conversation was in that last planning and zoning meeting very specifically was yes to keep those fees down the more we the more that's added the more they pay that's very just basic but a lot of these amenities and other things do feed into that and i just want to mention that real quick and that's all for me i agree with you um so my question for you then mr

behind is, again, we've got a potential question ahead of the board here. Is moving to a public hearing at this point premature? Are we ready for that? Do you have everything you need?

Our attempt was to keep the scope of the, this discussion very narrow because of the timeframe with, with when this needs to be adopted, if we want this to apply starting October 1st. Um, so, so we had a very narrow scope that we talked to with planning commission about, um, we have Michael Baker working in parallel that will have a much broader discussion, but there's no way that their discussion and any action from that can happen by October 1st. So, um, What we're attempting to do is having a very narrow scope, which planning commission recommended not changing any of the existing code at this point, but they did recommend the one provision regarding DRAs. If the board wanted to move forward with a public hearing to then adopt that one provision regarding DRAs, we can certainly do so and get that in place. If the board felt that we might as well wait for Michael Baker to complete their work and address everything, understanding that that will not be in place by October 1st, then we can put this on pause and wait till Michael Baker comes and presents their findings and we have those further discussions regarding the more nuanced type potential changes to the cluster code.

Okay, thank you. I think that's an important point here.

And what I would suggest, I don't mind adding the DRA. I think it's a good idea. Minimum lot size, obviously, it should be, there should be a minimum, at least a half. But I also, the big thing for me is net versus gross. And some properties might be, they're the same if they're flat. If I lived in the eastern shore, they'd all be the same. In Carroll County, we've got a lot of So the net versus gross is the big issue. And then the people are stuck with all this unbuildable space that they have to take care of. So if you can change that and put it out there, I'll be fine with holding on to this. And then the defined benefit through the DRA said maybe could we put shall instead of may? Because who decides the may?

The Board of County Commissioners.

The Board of County Commissioners.

So we come to us one way or another to decide whether we want the DRA. Yes. OK. Yeah.

So remember. We're on a timeframe timeline. This is between now and October 1st. You have, I say you have two choices. You, um, have a public hearing on, on this suggestion. or or one of or or changing one of the other these thank you you're getting really good at that or change or the board could choose on their own you've heard the Planning Commission's recommendation is not to do anything other than this DRA idea If the Board of County Commissioners wants to do that, fine. They can also choose one of these or some combination of these things listed here and go back to the 93 zoning code language. and implement that by October 1st. What we continue to say is we can't do anything, we do not have the bandwidth to do anything more than those two kinds of changes between now and October 1st. knowing that Michael Baker is working on this and will come to the board after that. But October 1st is that deadline with regard to the vesting on on residential properties. And since these are all residential, for the most part, then then then it has has an impact. So you can go to public hearing on the DRA idea. You can go to public hearing on one of these four changes. you could or you could choose not to go to public hearing and leave the code as it is at the moment which would be you know the regular old clustering that we've had for years knowing that again you will have an opportunity to change it and Michael Baker's recommendations come to the planning commission and come to you but there will be a period of time between October 1st and whenever that Michael Baker report comes forward and that zoning changes those zoning changes get accomplished, that developers could come in, become vested in that existing zoning law as it stands today, and develop based on that. There's another option.

The other option is right now this is a regime of something we can do. we can just remove it from anything that's not already approved and just be done with it until Michael Baker comes back with a suggestion on how.

Eliminate the option of cluster.

Yes, just temporarily until we come back instead of having this intermediate time of what should we do. So I would suggest that we either remove it or to protect ourselves is to change it to net.

um and then you don't have okay so the net versus gross remember the county has never ever ever used net okay um we did have the conventional plan versus the the regular plan but as as you've heard folks say it didn't change yield and so the the board of county commissioners one or two boards ago got rid of it the the um to to develop a plan that identifies what net versus gross is at this point it would be too much we don't have the bandwidth to do that that would require um and that's something that michael baker i believe is looking at um so those would be the part of the michael baker changes right so what you could do if you really wanted to go down that path would be the one it the very first one required conventional plan to determine the life

Well, and that's the issue. And I know the developers don't want to do that, and I don't expect them to want to do it. I wouldn't either. But that's the only way you know what your yield would be. There's no other way. If you're not looking at net and defining it, if you're not doing conventional plan, you don't know what the net is. And that's what's been happening. So we either need to require the conventional plan temporarily. There's several things. We require the conventional plan temporarily so you would have lot yield. And then you know, OK, I'm going to get 20, and I'm going to get 20 here. Or we can put in net and write in basic stuff on net. We didn't have stormwater management when this was done years and years ago in 1993. We didn't have all this. Or you can define the net, and that way you'd know. You've got to deduct out these unbuilt places you are not able to build. You don't have to lay out a conventional plan. You would just take that area you know where it is and deduct it and then do your yield. Or we can hold onto it until we get the right thing. But I don't want to have this. interim where we have this now and then this and then this because it's confusing. So which would be the easiest to do?

To your point, I would point out that we're down a commissioner up here. So, you know, we are very likely looking at some evenly split votes. I personally would rather do this right the first time. And I am pleasantly surprised with all the consultants coming along. I think they're doing a fantastic job. So before anybody decides to take a motion, and that's certainly your privilege, I am in favor of getting the consultant back from us.

OK, I would like to make a motion that we remove clustering from the code just for, should I say what we leave it for, or should I take it away? Remove clustering from the code for not agriculture, not conservation. For residential. For residential.

Residential zones.

For our zones. Yes, and that way, it'll just, there's none in the pipeline, and we're not expecting it to be in the pipeline, but if somebody would come up with something quickly, they'd have to either wait for that to come back, which would be a couple more months, or they can do a conventional.

This motion also includes historic zoning districts? Yes. Okay, so would you want to?

It's understood, yeah.

Okay.

Okay, so there's a motion to remove the option of clustering from residentially zoned. Do I have a...

So this would still need to be a public hearing. Oh yeah, absolutely.

I mean, we're still talking about...

So what the motion should say, if I may, is that you would want to move the board direct staff to schedule a public hearing for a potential text amendment to remove cluster subdivision provisions from the residential and historic zoning districts.

move that we you just say what I said I'm gonna say what Roberta said I'm gonna direct staff to schedule a public hearing I'd ask for it to be the same night as the other hearing because it's not going to be that much do it at the same time direct staff to have a public schedule a public hearing in that same time frame to look at removing clustering from our current code for residential

And historic districts.

And historic districts. Residential historic districts.

Residential and historic.

And historic.

That is the motion. Is there a second? OK. Seeing none, that motion fails. Do we have an additional motion or any further discussion?

I had another comment and question. I think we've delayed people enough. And cluster subdivisions. never ever are they allowed to have more lots, that most they can have the same lots. Rarely do they get the same number of lots because of cramping things down. They might end up with six less lots or whatever. I do think we have an opportunity, which I've mentioned before, to get a pretty good piece of property um free or at low cost that carroll county could make a park regional stormwater management and a park regional stormwater management and a school site whatever i think if we continue to delay this that developer will do they did the full plan they will do it and uh um and we'll lose that opportunity i'd love to see this stuff go to a public hearing and see what people think um i i it's it's uh And I don't want to limit them even more. We've done so much today to raise the cost of housing in Carroll County. When you make a road four foot wider, when you make a walk 25% bigger, when you add other paths, you've increased stormwater management immensely. And the homeowners may or may not have to maintain that, but the cost goes into the lots. It goes into the thing. And delaying, we talked about, and I respect that, we need to do the process quicker. The first item, we've delayed them for eight months already, so it's going to be 13, 14, 15 months till something's done. This one, again, I just don't understand why we want to delay it. And like I say, they can't get more lots. And the last point I'd like to make, in counting the jurisdictions, many many people in carroll county live on a third acre or less and they have huge they have houses bigger than i want they have huge houses on a third acre on a quarter acre much less than 20 000 and uh and i i think if the county can benefit from it which we get to decide um then it's worth it but all right first of all you can't cluster on r40 is that correct

Yes. Yes, yes. Is it correct, or yes, you can? Yes, you can. Yes, you can cluster our 40.

It has to be our 20. We can't do the retirement thing.

All right, so the one thing that is said, and this is what I'm not sure of. I keep saying we can't get more lots, but we don't know that. Because we don't know it because we don't make them do conventional, which I know is a lot of work and it takes money. And we don't make them take out the undivided. the unbuildable place. So if you don't do net, then you need to do conventional because you don't know that you can't get more lots. And everybody keeps saying you can't get more lots, but we don't know that because you don't ever delineate where the buildable space is.

If I may, so when you cluster and you reduce the size of the lots, so say it's R40 and you have a 40,000 square foot lot and you want to reduce that size because you're clustering, the amount that you reduce that then needs to be open space.

so you're not creating more space that you can get more lots but you're you're getting back to my original argument of what do we call open space and we call it the stormwater management ponds we haven't defined that i'm basically saying this clustering is sort of like the retirement home but that eliminates but by by saying the

As Chris said, you have an acre. You say you can build now two houses on that acre instead of one. You have to reserve that whole acre as open space. Now, the definition of open space does not matter for this conversation. The definition of open space only matters for something else. In this conversation, in terms of whether or not you're getting more, it doesn't allow you to get more. Because, think of it, If I could put two houses on one acre now, whereas before I could put two houses on two acres, it's the exact same. Because now that second acre, even though I can't build a house on it, I'm reserving it for something later on. We can all disagree or agree on what we reserve it for, whether that's valuable open space or not. But that's a different calculation and a different conversation than whether or not you get more yacht life.

one thing that's concerning me right now it seems to me and I didn't know this before maybe I'm just sort of dense I didn't realize we were trying to do this to help to do a deal that you want to make that that's not how we do stuff if you want to make a deal to say we want to make a deal in my district right now we're trying to look at what is in the code and what I just read to you how things should be done and I read you and I believe that you have land use there should be some value to it And right now, the way we're doing it, there should be some predictability to the neighborhood, consistency with the neighborhood. That's what we're trying to get back to. These clustering for years has not done what it's supposed to. I think I've showed you some of those. Some of them has been in a stream bed. And it's jammed houses really close together on a fifth of an acre. And they jammed up against the road. And they're using the entire thicketed stream bed as their clustering. That's allowed. That would still be allowed. Maybe they're getting the same yield. I don't know. But there is literally no value to that thicket of a stream bed that we're not going to put a bridge across and spend $1.6 million for, by the way. So I guess when you don't see what I'm talking about, it can still be done that way. And that's since the very beginning of last fall. That's what I've been trying to get to. We either need to put the conventional in so the yield is truly. I know what you're saying. I don't think it's accurate. We either need to put the conventional plan back in to see what the lots would look like and see what and then figure out the yield and then figure out because the open space should not be a thicketed stream bed for a community and stick these houses against a road with a fifth of an acre when it was supposed to be a half of an acre. Yes. And that's and that's that's what I think I'm hearing. I didn't realize that there was like we had no projects that are involved there even in the planning stages. But it seems to me like somebody was trying to get one to be pushed through. from what I'm hearing, and I didn't know that, and I'm a little frustrated about that.

I'm proposing this for multiple projects. There won't be very many clustering. And I brought up that project because that's in process, and we're delaying it.

It's not in process. OK, but we're going to avoid it.

Yeah, I'd like to. I let you talk for a half hour. I'd like to talk for 30 seconds.

OK. OK, we're going to.

So and no way we add the conventional plan. We're adding money to the developers. We're adding time to the system. We sit here and say we want to make affordable housing and we want to cut the system. almost everything we have done delays the system and makes the houses cost more the conventional plan if we want to do it so be it it does not limit them on lots and and you'd have to show me a subdivision where they clustered and got as many or more lots than they planned and and and i've seen many of them we're at the point in carroll county How many cluster subdivisions are possible? Half a dozen, less? It's hard to have land suit that. I just don't understand why we want to keep delaying things and add the cost. We're making housing unaffordable in Carroll County, and that's okay. That's all right. Again, I mentioned the project I shouldn't have if I offended you. Sorry. But that was just an example. I think anytime the county can benefit, getting 20 or 30 acres, we should consider it. And that's what this would do. We would consider it, and we still have the say over whether we let it happen or not. And I'm sorry I offended you if I've clarified that you misunderstand a lot, Yale, but I'm sorry.

We just have a different opinion. We have a different opinion on things.

I'm done.

I'm done now. Or what?

Okay.

I'm going to go ahead and start. We can't base decisions on inaccurate facts. I'm sorry.

I know and there's a lot to this. None of these are particularly simple issues. I'm going to again ask my fellow commission members, we've got to give the staff a direction here. At the same time, we have a consultant who's trying to address all these questions and all these issues. Even some of the secondary and tertiary issues you've mentioned, I think, are part of what we're paying the consultant to do. So I will ask my fellow commissioners, what do we want to do right now on this issue? I think we've talked about it enough. What do we want to do? Or will we do nothing?

It's something that I brought up last fall. It's something that's a big issue in my district. No one's ever even pointed out in their district where it's a problem. In my district, it is. How it's been interpreted and what we're getting out of it. Now I'm finding out that we might be going to try to push something through during this period of time, which would really be Unprofessional. I did not know in my own district. I keep going back to the master plan. Excuse me. I want to go back to the master plan. We have land uses for a reason. I'm trying to get things back to predictability for everyone, the developer, and for the homeowners, and for the adjacent communities. All of these properties we're talking about talked about ad nauseum for seven years. And we were given predictability. We were given, we believed, a master plan that it was supposed to be, the land use. Unfortunately, some of the devil's in the details. And then there are these changes that they might seem little, but they're not little. So this needs to be revisited. What's the purpose of the clustering? And I'm suggesting it's a regime. And if Michael Baker doesn't come back until October, November, then we're a month behind. We're not holding anything back. So I'm just suggesting that we either make you do the conventional. I would rather just take it off the books for now so somebody can look and just do conventional. And then when they come back, we'll say, is this something that would benefit? Because you're still taking away the underlying land use. You're still allowing something that was not necessarily anticipated when it was supposed to fit into an existing neighborhood. And that's how they were decided during a very, very, very long many people involved. I could sit here forever and show you about what was discussed then and this way they changed it in 2022. It did not go along with what the master plan was discussed. And that's what's been bothering me for all this time, is it's not aligned. And I've said that since the beginning. These changes, I bet you went back and see, did anybody weigh in on these changes in 2022? No. Why did we say no minimum may allow for just just the difference the the small different things is is not what was discussed so you know the maximum by gross acre and getting rid of the conventional plan i understand why but there's no other way to look at it so i'm asking it's my district it's our master plan i'm trying no one has ever produced except for their feelings they not produce any kind of documentation looked at the master plan, looked at the zoning codes, and said, here, here's why we want to do it. Here's what we were told. Here's in writing. Here's all the documentation. I'm not saying what I want. I'm saying how do we follow what we, by law, are supposed to follow, the master plan and the intentions of it. And as I've said a lot before, I think the intentions in the zoning during The darkness of COVID were not exactly the beneficial, and I do not believe that they aligned with what we were told. And I could spend, I have a lot more stuff here I can share with you, but that's what I'm asking to do. And I'm not just saying it because Susan wants it and she's here now. I'm trying to make sure that we are implementing a plan that we are required to do, and so is our planning commission. And I do get frustrated when I don't even see them ever referring to the master plan or ever referring to the land use or ever referring to the ordinances. That's what we're required to do. It's not what we want to do. It's not their new idea.

Commissioner, do you have a question? Thank you.

What I would like to suggest is we remove clustering temporarily.

You already made that motion.

I'm going to. So again, I think. If I could real quick, I just want to ask a question for clarification.

Commissioner Gordon. So Mr. Hine. Today, the whole purpose of this is for us to potentially move forward to a public hearing for potential text amendments in club and cluster subdivision and residential and historical zoning districts. Am I correct in this does not specify what those may be? Correct. okay i i greatly appreciate everyone's thoughts and passions on this topic today but clearly this is not something that's going to be resolved today and finalized without having a public hearing no matter what the opinions and ideas are and i'm not discounting anyone's but i think our best point at this at this juncture is very simply this and i'm going to make a motion I move the Board of Carroll County Commissioners direct staff to schedule a public hearing for potential text amendments to cluster subdivisions in residential and historic zoning districts.

Second.

There's a motion and a second discussion.

And I'd just like to say this doesn't keep us from doing that in the next week, two weeks, whatever. And I'd like to make a point. the comment was made you were surprised by this project I've showed you the plans multiple times you shouldn't be surprised but I apologize if you were and but it I brought it up as an example I probably shouldn't have brought it up but I didn't think it would so we do have a motion

And I want to clarify the motion. I feel compelled to do this. The motion for what potential text amendments?

So the recommendation from the Planning Commission is not to make any changes to existing code, but to add the provision related to DRAs. So that's what would be presented as what the public hearing would be about. We would hear from the public, and then the board can certainly take it whatever direction you wish following that public hearing.

So we would have a public hearing on this particular text change, but however, comma, at some point in the fall, in October, we're going to have a whole slew of potential text amendments that would more than likely go to public hearing that we're going to get from the consultant.

Yes, so following the public hearing, if the board wanted to take action on what we've talked about today, which is the potential changes of going back to 1993 for the four items or the new provision, you could take action on that immediately after the public hearing, because that would be germane to the discussion of what's been discussed today and what the public hearing is about. then in the future Michael Baker will be will be back with us to talk about all the nuances and that would start a new process right because now we're we are potentially talking about additional changes to cluster you we would ask for you to direct us to work with planning commission on those nuances and then we would come back it would be at that whole process on more nuanced changes to the cluster so we have a motion to move to public hearing on this particular

Text amendment changed. It's just one for now. We do have a second. All in favor?

Wait, wait. I just want to ask. If we could do this, I'd like to. You can make that be the recommended motion by the Planning Commission. But I think having the options that people understand. The average person doesn't understand this. They just know that during the master plan process, this was zoned x. And this is what they believed that was going to happen. So as I said when I read Mr. Kuhman's stuff about it's disingenuous because people really don't get what we're trying to do here. They're not getting x that fits in with their community. They could get y. So if you at least offer and say what you have here, these are the different options, and then say this is one that's recommended, at least they would sort of have an idea it's a confusing topic um but i i think it needs to be explained here's here's what we're looking at do you suggest keeping it the same or it could be removing until we get then the different options will be up there Joe Neighbor just knows that we have a master plan that says this, and this is what we're expecting. And so I think we have a duty to explain what we're trying to do to keep that underlying zoning intact and not be disingenuous, like I believe that we have been. So if we get put out, this is the recommendation, but here are the other things that are happening. We could hold it. We could wait.

make some changes that way they'd be giving some options other verse I don't even think I wished unfortunately we do have a motion on the table though I feel compelled I mean are we gonna we do have a motion on the table we do have a second let's finish up with that motion all in favor of that motion aye opposed OK that motion that's OK so that motion does pass 3 to 1. Again I I I feel we we I just want to remind we have another issue here we all have meetings this afternoon some of us have multiple meetings that are outside of the building. So we're going to have to try to keep things moving along. Are there any further discussions on this issue? Because it's just starting, if you will, with the things we're going to get back from the consultant and the way you and your staff have put those together. I feel as though they have been easier to understand, which is money well spent. So are there any, if no further discussions on this particular item, let's move into the second one, if I could, please. And that's going to be. My favorite. Discussion regarding text amendments to chapters 155, 156, and 158 accessory dwelling units.

You like it so much, you can't even say it.

And I would remind anybody of public comment or on the phone to stand by.

So you two are bringing in a fresh body. Yes, yes. Good afternoon.

I'm here to discuss the Planning and Zoning Commission's recommended response to the state of Maryland's initiated legislation of HB 1466, accessory dwelling units. This will be a presentation and a request to go to public hearing. just to first go over what this presentation will entail. We'll have a little bit of background. Then we'll discuss the requirements and restrictions imposed by the Act. And then we'll go over the Planning Commission recommendations and open it for question and discussion. Obviously, that can also come at any time if you need to ask or discuss anything along the way. First, a little bit of background. Last year, the Maryland General Assembly passed HB 1466, also known as Accessory Dwelling Units Requirements and Prohibitions, and that requires jurisdictions adopt local regulations that align with HB 1466 regarding state regulations for accessory dwelling units by October 1st of 2026. we did bring this presented this to the Board of County Commissioners on April 23rd of this year and we're and the commissioners directed staff to work with the Planning Commission to draft to craft text amendments in response to the Act and then May through July the Over five sessions, the planning commission did work with staff to craft the recommended text. And during that time, comp planning staff also worked with the Maryland Department of Health, permits, and public works, zoning, development review, attorney's office, ag pres, and emergency services. It was really a lot of agencies involved. And we have a few behind me right now. Also, if there are some questions that we can't answer here at the table, that they've come here to help out. So they have also brought a lot of invaluable knowledge and some of the changes could affect their agencies as well. Their input has been greatly appreciated during this. Next, we'll go on to the requirements of HB 1466. And just a reminder that these requirements are countywide. And on this particular slide, we'll go over the requirement and then the impact factor. And then in the slide six through eight, we'll go over more in depth on the impact factor. those that do conflict in certain areas so the requirements are allow the creation of an accessory dwelling unit on land anywhere there's a single-family dwelling and that's something we already allow because the 80 used in our current code are allowed in every district so that is aligned there's no conflict there the definitions presented by the legislation The state legislation does conflict with our current code, and that's that the new definition impacts the ADU allowable size. And again, we'll go over that a little more in depth on slides six through eight. Another requirement of the act, provide for construction of ADUs that meet public health, safety, and welfare standards. And again, that does align with our current code, so that was no conflict there. And another requirement, exclude ADUs from density calculations. Again, already aligned with that requirement. And exclude development of an ADU from any measures that limit residential growth on the property on which the unit is proposed. Right now, in the residential districts, there's a requirement for subdivision rights to be able to add a detached accessory dwelling unit right now. So that is in conflict with that requirement. The act also has some restrictions that it imposes. Jurisdictions are prohibited from imposing additional parking requirements on ADUs without first completing a parking study to determine the jurisdiction's parking needs. And right now, our code does have additional parking requirements for ADUs. So that does conflict. And then the act also prohibits establishing side and rear setbacks that exceed existing accessory structure setback requirements. And that's actually already what we do. So that aligns with our current code as well. So there were three identified areas that are in conflict with our current code for the requirements and restrictions from the act. And we'll go into those a little more in depth now. For the definition. The definition and size are a factor. And I do apologize, that should say HB 1466 impact factor at the top there on these next three sides and not area as it does. So what is the area of our current code that is impacted by those three factors that we went over in the requirements and restrictions? And where does our code not align with those requirements and restrictions? So for the definition, the chapters 155 and 158 ADU definitions of our own code, the definition does not include size or type of the primary dwelling unit. So it's not, the 75% is not currently, nor any size requirement in our current definition of an ADU. And we do not, in our current definition of an ADU, distinguish what type it can coexist with. Also in the impact area is the Ag and Conservation Act ADU with a maximum size of 1,000 feet. That is affected. In the residential districts, the attached ADU currently has a maximum size of 800 square feet. And that is affected. And then the residential detached ADU currently has no maximum size. It is unlimited. And that is also affected by the 75%. The next impact area. or impact factor for HB 1466 is the subdivision right requirement in the residential district for a detached ADU. We currently require the subject property to have subdivision rights to be able to build an ADU. And the bill does restrict that. It's prohibited. Next we'll move on to parking requirements, the impact factor of parking requirements for the impact area of ag and conservation. One additional off-street parking space is currently required for each bedroom in the accessory dwelling unit. In the residential district for attached ADUs, it's required for two additional off-street parking spaces. And in the residential district for detached ADUs, Currently, we require two off-street parking spaces for those as well. And again, the act does prohibit from imposing additional parking requirements on ADUs without first completing a parking study to determine the jurisdiction's parking needs. So that was what the act requires and where our current code is already aligned and in conflict with it. But we also did receive some additional planning and zoning commission direction. And that's listed here. They wanted to create a single accessory dwelling unit ordinance, prohibit Future subdivision of ADUs without having the rights to subdivide. Three, prohibit regulations from overriding HOA rules and restrictions. Constrain the size as much as we could, given the size in the definition. Draft parking regulations. Prohibit ADUs from impacting the ability to build a primary dwelling. keep bulk requirements as is, and prohibit ADUs on lots allowed on agricultural preservation properties. And next, we'll go through those one by one. First, create a single accessory dwelling unit ordinance. We went ahead and created, or proposed, the proposed amendment creates 158.176, a separate accessory dwelling units ordinance and section. includes regulations that previously existed in the agricultural and conservation districts, regulation of accessory uses, and the residential districts regulation of accessory uses. So instead of having accessory dwelling units listed under accessory uses in each zoning district, It was just decided or proposed that everything would get moved into its own accessory dwelling units section of the code. And there is an added purpose and intent of this. And that does, let me get to my notes real quick on that one. I apologize. That purpose and intent does reflect housing goals from the adopted county planning documents. And that's the purpose and intent of this section is to allow for the creation of an accessory dwelling unit as a permitted use on any lot with an existing single family detached dwelling in keeping with the existing and planned character of the community in order to provide a range of housing choices to meet the needs of the citizens of Carroll County. So kind of went into the existing code and moved over things that were consistent with each other. and did not conflict with the act itself. So some things that kind of aligned across the different zoning district current regulations were A through E here and part of M. And we'll go into M a little more in depth in a moment. So only one accessory dwelling unit shall be permitted on a lot. The property owner must occupy either the primary dwelling unit or the detached dwelling unit on the lot or parcel. An accessory dwelling unit must have direct access from the outside. The accessory dwelling unit shall have no more than two bedrooms. And the accessory dwelling unit shall meet all applicable local, state, and federal laws and ordinances, including the building construction and Maryland Department of Health and Maryland Department of Environment codes. Again, those were already brought out. They were consistent across the regulations that already exist. So M is only brought over from the Ag and Conservation current regulations. That's accessory dwelling units shall not be located more than 50 feet from the primary dwelling. So that only exists currently in the Ag and Conservation zoning district accessory uses. And then this next portion was added to try to make it so that the thought is it can't be closer to the neighbor's yard or the neighbor's dwelling than it is to your own dwelling. So that added language is and shall not be located closer to an existing primary dwelling on an adjacent lot than it is to the primary dwelling on the subject property. So moving on to the second and third directives by the Planning and Zoning Commission to prohibit subdivision of ADUs and prohibit regulations from overriding HOA rules and restrictions, we have here, For N1 and 2, does not eliminate or modify any applicable private covenant deed restriction or homeowner association requirements and does not constitute verification of compliance with any private covenant or homeowner association restriction. And then also for the subdivision approval of an accessory dwelling unit shall not create additional subdivision density or development rights. And these are both already, they already exist in current regulations. This is kind of a reinforcement in this portion to just have them here so people are aware that those exist and they are just reinforced here. Next we'll move on to number four of the directives, constrain the size. So some added language here that kind of says what we'll be using for the, sorry, what we'll be using to measure the 75%, and that's what I is here. For getting the square footage, the total square footage of the primary dwelling unit, the living area above grade of the primary dwelling shall be the living area reported by the Maryland State Department of Assessments and Taxation, or SDAT. And then for an internal dwelling unit, the floor area does, oh, I apologize again. This one I'm. It's all over the place. For J, for purposes of administering the accessory dwelling unit regulations of this chapter, the floor area does not include open porches and et cetera there. Those two are really just for laying the groundwork for the following, which is how how the size of the dwelling units will be determined. For the livable floor area of any internal accessory dwelling unit, that's an accessory dwelling unit that is entirely within the primary dwelling unit, it shall not exceed 75% of the above ground living area of the primary dwelling unit. So that's that 75% of the SDAT reported square footage of the dwelling unit. For the detached and attached, it's measured in two ways. That's both by not more than 75% of that SDAT number or that above ground living area of the primary dwelling unit, but also measured by not more than the square footage of the footprint of that accessory dwelling unit, whether it's attached to the primary dwelling unit or it's detached from the primary dwelling unit, that floor print may not exceed 75% of the footprint of the primary dwelling unit. Stretching my verbal abilities here. So by calculating that 75% by the footprint and there are bulk requirement height restrictions and the above ground floor area helps keep the ADU both subordinate and smaller visually and actually smaller as well. Next, we'll move on to the directive to draft parking regulations. For F here, the site should accommodate the anticipated parking needs of both the primary dwelling unit and the accessory dwelling unit through existing and additional lawful off street parking where feasible and or available on street parking. Nothing in this section shall be construed as authorizing the creation of parking areas within required yards in the design and placement of the accessory dwelling unit consideration shall be given to the ability of parking and the potential impacts of the parking demand on adjacent properties and public streets and to the next one prohibit ad use from impacting ability to build a primary dwelling This affects adequate public facilities and concurrency management regulations because that's what restricts the development of new dwelling units. If facilities are found to be inadequate, then restrictions can be placed on development. We're addressing that, or it's proposed to address that in 156.07, Residential Development Database and Annual Report, which is a concurrency management report that staff produces every year. And right now, ADUs are now being reported as lumped in with new dwelling units. So they're not tracked separately in any way, but are exempt from Chapter 156 and concurrency managements. the APFO and concurrency management regulations. So ADUs would remain exempt by this proposed text, but will be tracked and reported so the Planning Commission and the Board of County Commissioners can determine how pervasive ADUs are becoming. And you'll be able to restrict development in areas where facilities are being burdened. So basically, you can't build an ADU if you can't build a house, if that's what you would like to see. Um. And then keep the bulk requirements was number seven as far as the directives. And that was easy enough. For G, an agricultural, conservation, residential, and employment campus and heritage districts, the accessory dwelling unit must comply with the bulk requirement standards of an accessory structure in the underlying zone. That already existed, so that was easy enough. The next one, in commercial and industrial districts, it was a little different because it was kind of ambiguous in those. As it's currently written, so in commercial and industrial districts, the accessory dwelling unit must comply with the bulk requirement standards of an accessory structure in the R7500 residence district. That language came from bulk requirements that existed in the industrial zoning district's bulk requirements for a residential dwelling in a rural village. So it's language that already exists, just moved it over here to to have something standardized and more explicit. So the last directive that was given by the Planning and Zoning Commission was to prohibit ADUs on lots allowed on agricultural preservation properties. The impact area is the zoning for this, and the current regulations allow all zoning districts to have ADUs as long as, and that approval is conditioned on all other agencies or any other agencies concerned. So right now what it basically says is that agricultural land preservation review is required for those ADUs, and they are subject to the AgPres contract as it currently is. So right now zoning would say, by zoning you're okay, but then it would kick up to AgPres and they would look at the contract that for any AgPres in the area, was that lot that is no longer subject to AgPres, did it have any restrictions by AgPres standards that it needed to adhere to? And then it would just be subject to whatever the contract said. If the contract did not restrict anything, then the lot would be allowed by zoning as long as it met all the requirements to have an ADU there. But with this current language, regardless of the contract, whether it prohibits or allows dwelling on those lots no longer subject to the ag easement, this would prohibit it across the board. So that would no longer be allowed. And that is Q, accessory dwelling units shall not be permitted on lots allowed on agricultural preservation properties. So just a couple more things for the recommended text amount. We don't have to go through it all. Just wanted to point out that the For 155 and 158, the definitions for accessory dwelling units did change. They align the basic accessory dwelling unit language with the state requirement. And we did add for the purposes of the measurement of the allowable size for the internal accessory dwelling unit to be different from the attached and detached, we added a definition for internal dwelling units. And that little portion for the adequate public facilities and concurrency management section of the code, this is the portion that says that accessory dwelling units will be tracked and reported separately, so they will not be lumped in with just dwelling units anymore, so you will be very aware of how pervasive those are becoming. And again, 158 definitions. And then just added building footprint, again, for the purposes of measuring the 75%. Would you prefer that I went through all of the remaining red line texts If not, we'll skip ahead to questions and discussion.

Thank you very much. Incredibly well put together. I know I sound like a broken record, but thank you very much for that. I see a couple very relevant staff members in the audience. I don't know if we had any comments from anybody else who was here. I know that these are going to affect some of what you do yourselves back there. OK, so questions or discussion from the board?

I just have one question. which is really easy to we ever hear anything back from mouth because planning and zoning had asked that we reach out the mouth and there have been no response regarding the ADU discussion I was just curious if there was ever any feedback officially from them I have not heard anything I believe legal was just curious but other than that I appreciate it looks good there's there's so many devil in the details here because sums on the large lot and sums could be

right next to somebody's lot line. So does this apply to site plans and subdivisions? So if the property is singly owned by a community association?

No. So a site plan, so similar to like an age-restricted type development, that sort of thing, would not be subject to ADUs because if i'm struggling to imagine the scenario where someone who had a condominium owned they don't own the land they own just their their house right and if there was some desire of maybe an internal i don't want to get into internal they would be looking to build something on property that's owned by the management company right so if there was that desire for the management company to to create an adu type that would be a revised site plan, an amended site plan.

So the way that the state law came down, I mean, obviously they're requiring the counties to make sure this happens to someone else who owns a certain property. So you're telling me that if a corporation owns that property, they're not... on a site plan not required to do it? What if a corporation owns a regular home?

Are they required to do it? Then it's a single-family home, and you could build it.

There are single-family homes on site plans. I mean, I'm looking at it. No, no.

It's the ownership of the land. Oh, I know. You don't own the land. So I could have a single-family home in a site plan community, but I don't own the land. So I wouldn't have the right to apply for a development review process. Poorly said, but you know what I mean. um to to file all the paperwork and and and follow through with with um creating a a um an accessory and accessory dwelling unit i'm having as many trouble thank you yeah you caught it from commissioner garren if i could also make me feel better

I could also add our interpretation is that with the definition referring to primary single-family detached dwellings that if you have a site plan you have no way of determining what the primary is so it wouldn't apply

oh it's just interesting because i mean the way we do things here is a little different some of these big counties have huge site plans with hundreds of single-family homes on them they so they would not be able to do an adu on those plans okay so the other thing i question about um on slide 11 i get 11. it talks about the property owner may occupy either the primary dwelling or the attached dwelling um adus are good for certain things but i'm looking at Mom, Pa die, or some of the people, they don't want to live there anymore. So now you have two dwellings on the same house. And you've got to now sell two dwellings, or you've got to rent it out. So how do you know? It says the property owner must occupy the primary dwelling. Who enforces that? How do you know that? Why couldn't they rent it out and just say somebody lives with them?

It becomes two rental.

I'm worried about them becoming two rental properties in the next gyration.

Permits does require an affidavit, assigned affidavit that the homeowner will occupy one of the two dwelling units. And then after that, it would be a zoning violation by reported zoning violation.

And then what can happen? What happens with that?

we got a reported a report of a suspected violation our inspector would go out to the property make a visit they have different criteria that they look for to determine whether it's one dwelling unit or more and then depending on whether that additional dwelling unit has been permitted or whether the owner exists in one of those dwelling units that would be a they'd have to verify that and if the property is in violation they'd have to correct that violation within a certain time period or be fined

No, I'm just thinking of a situation where I know a lot of houses are being rehabbed, which is good. They're taking old houses. And they're small lots, small rancher. They're putting in new windows, rehabbing them, reselling them. But then that person would own that. The one that's rehabbing it would own the property. And they could put an AD on it because they own the property. They could live there while they're doing it. sell it and then rent it i mean it just seems like there's the potential for abuse of it very fraught with with danger there for sure yeah and it's going to be an enforcement nightmare so when the setbacks it says the purpose state law is required on 13 it says for purpose administering the dwelling act the floor air does not include open porches open decks patios balconies exterior so but the setbacks I'm not sure what they are in all residential areas, but I know my setback's 20 feet. So let's say, and the shed, what's a shed setback? It says the same as a accessory structure. So what is an accessory structure in, I thought it was like 10, five feet?

Five or 10 feet? Yeah, it depends on which side, whether it's a side, back, or front. I don't recall the dimensions off the top of my head.

The reason I'm asking, I didn't know, I shouldn't admit this, but I didn't know I needed a permit for my shed that I had there for 30 years. But when I found out for the next shed, I got it. And it had to be 10 foot from the property line, which I think it was. But I had to do the little plat thing. So this pretty much, and it might be different for different types of properties. It might be five feet from some. But if you can do all these things, a porch, an open deck, a patio, a balcony, exterior, That's a lot. And it could go five feet from a property line. And the next house might be, I mean, some of these houses are in quarter acre lots. So you could end up with some of these exterior things very, very close to a property line. You know what I'm saying? In the situation, I'm trying to think of all different situations. But this is on a quarter acre lot, half acre lot. I mean, do those things, the encroachments, do we have to have that? Or is that required? Or is that something we put in there?

So correct me if I'm wrong, Tiffany, but what the code requires is that the accessory dwelling unit has to meet the same setback requirements as other structures. So like a shed, right? That includes any sort of peripheral type. Like if you put a balcony or a porch or anything like that, that would have to meet the setback requirements. The definition that you were looking at where it said it excludes that, that's only for the calculation of the area of the principal dwelling to determine that the size of the ADU has to be 75% or less of that.

No, but I'm just thinking of somebody that has their ADU. Yep. And then they're going to put a patio around it. That has to meet setbacks. But the setbacks I know for a patio are 25% of the, let's say mine's 20 feet. It's 25% of the side yard setback. So it's five feet. So if they only have a 10 foot setback, side setback, the way I think it is for our 20, it's 25%. 25% of 10 feet means it could be seven and a half feet.

Yes, I understand what you're saying.

I'm just saying, I don't know if that's something that might, because that could really encroach on the next property owner more than the dwelling, because it's open, it's outside. And I'm not sure if that's something that we put in or we have to do that. I mean, it depends on the lot. But that's pretty close to somebody's home. I mean, somebody's lot is closer than this, of a patio or a balcony. So just think about that in all different situations. You don't want to devalue someone else's property. The accessory dwelling is one thing, but the stuff on the outside that they can do, it could be pretty extensive. And then on the bulk, it's the same question about the bulk requirements. So the accessory structure, it says here, with the bulk requirement standards on an accessory structure, what else other than a shed is that? Would that be like a gazebo? What else is an accessory structure?

It could currently be just a Any list that actually, I guess in the code, if we go to the red line code. And I can do that.

No, I'm looking at.

Like here, some of the accessory uses. Let me go here. So the accessory dwelling unit is one use among many for accessory uses in these districts. And so here, whatever the use would be, would be the beauty parlor, barbershop, cemetery, cottage industry uses. So all those uses, wait a minute, is that the same structure though?

I mean it would be most typically something like a shed I would anticipate something like if you had chickens in your backyard that would be an accessory I'm looking here it says I mean this could be on commercial industrial properties

His dog talks about R75, 100, which is a very small lot. What's that? Six of an acre? So you have a house on this lot, and they have a little teeny setback, and they can put now 75%. I'm just trying to look at all the scenarios on some of these tight lots, and it could affect someone else's property value I don't know which of these we have to do on some of these smaller Lots when you're on a big lot it doesn't really matter but you're on a small lot somebody's next to you and it could and then that person could do the same thing you're changing a whole dynamic of it's a possibility so on those I'd be careful of what we're doing and then one other thing did the this account the towns they all have to do this as well do you know what they're doing I mean are they following similar or any discussion with our towns we had a couple towns reach out to

for direction on where to find our current recommended code. I think they're just looking at that, trying to get it all under done before October 1. So they're looking to us for some direction.

What I'm looking at is the towns, and obviously the Freedom Area, have the most dense areas. So that's where it's going to be more problematic, because there's some tight spots. So I didn't know if they had any ideas either, because they're looking at their town. There's a house on Lane Street. Very nice. And now you can put a dwelling next to it, and it's a setback.

with you fortunately in those areas, you've got a lot of ways as well. So that may may limit some of the damage, which I would like downtown Westminster particular, um, particular legislation is, is in my view harmful as well. Um, any any further comments or questions? We do have a potential motion in front of us and we are, we are pressed for time. I want to let my colleagues know that

Let me just ask one more question. Does sanitation include a washer and dryer? What is sanitation when it says permanent provisions must have sleeping, cooking, eating, and sanitation?

I believe that's running water. Bathroom. Bathroom.

But they don't have to have washer and dryer?

No.

They don't have to have clothing? No. Okay.

Okay.

Move the Board of Commissioners proceed with the public hearing for proposed amendments to the Carroll County or County code chapters, one 55, one foot and one 58 relating to accessory dwelling units.

We have a motion. Do we have a second second? We have a motion and a second. Any further discussion?

I just ask, as we do these things, if problems come up, as you start to implement, if there's things that we need to adjust, we maybe should. You know what I'm saying? Because as you start to say, this is how it's going to work, we might say, this isn't working right. And maybe we need to adjust some things. It's not like this is written in stone.

Hopefully state law will allow us to do that.

Well, maybe state law will figure out it's going to affect.

They're coming back.

Correct, yeah.

The idea of these are not bad. It's just the devil's in the details, and they should leave that up to the locals.

That's right. And I do want to commend the Planning and Zoning Commission for having the foresight to list some of these. I find that it'll be for future boards to grapple with. But this issue of the potential subdivisions of property, I just don't think that's going to go away. And that could just be potentially devastating for counties like ours. This particular legislation is certainly not our friend. So any further discussion? We do have a motion. We do have a second. all in favor aye opposed no the motion to go to public hearing passes unanimously thank you again very much thank you i've got something for admin open but i'd like to do it while chris is still here you mind i'm sure okay um

The Planning Commission had a session on the Ethiopian church. Yes. There was a lot of confusion. I had an appointment before and after, stopped by for five minutes, and that was all I could do. I keep getting quizzed by community members. The decision, I think, was EMS would go there and inspect things for safety, and they were required to do a traffic study. I think that was it. And if you could just verify this. Sure. So yeah. And then the question last night, I got what happens next? Did any of this happen yet? Will the state recognize the traffic study, etc, etc. So can and if not right now, can you give me an update on where the where the thing is?

Yeah, so I don't recall the exact motion that the Planning Commission made, but essentially what they directed the church to come back with was a traffic impact study and an evaluation of fire and EMS service to that location. And so what we have directed the church, because there are some questions and confusions as to exactly what the scope and what they need to do and so on. What we've told the church is that they need to come back to Planning Commission and with their traffic engineer expert and with a fire EMS expert and try and address the Planning Commission's questions.

So not the county EMS. They need to get an expert.

They need to provide somebody. Now, they could certainly request somebody from the county to be their expert, but that's entirely up to them. So they need to come before Planning Commission and try and address Planning Commission's questions and concerns. If Planning Commission wants additional, like a traffic impact study to be completed, then Planning Commission will have to give them the scope of what that study would look like.

That'll be a public meeting.

And that, absolutely, that will be a public meeting. And they have not requested that yet.

Is it waiting on the church?

Yes.

So it's not waiting on the planning commission. It's waiting on the church.

Yes, we're waiting for the church to make a decision as to how they would come back and respond to the planning commission's concerns.

And they haven't been real quick with responding to date. So it's on them. Yes. And for the record, too, I tried to tell people Since this has been going on, we haven't allowed them to get a permit for, what is it, more than 50 people?

So the religious events that they have, I think it's twice a year. Going back a couple of years, we were issuing those permits. They were not making good progress in addressing the site plan, and so we told them we stopped issuing those permits. So we have not issued those permits, those temporary use permits, for at least a year or two.

Okay.

another question about the same thing if this was not I know it's a church can go on that type of property but if this wasn't a church and they did the same thing it was just a group of people could they do the same similar activities like whatever they do the music large group gatherings music so could it could a music venue be put up on the same thing in the same property in the same way

So it depends on the permanent type of infrastructure that you're constructing. So if you wanted to build a Meriwether post-pavilion type facility, that's a permanent facility. So that would have to go through our process of the development review process and site development plan, traffic studies of the whole nine yards. if you are dealing with strictly a is that is that a loud use on ag or a conditional use if you wanted to do that i don't think it's either okay okay i'm just i'm trying to figure out so if it were just but if it's just a farm field and and a farmer wanted to host a some sort of event let's say they want to build the same structure everything's the same except it's just a

You and me. We want to have this. A bill to structure. It's not called a church. It's just exactly the same they're asking for. Could you still do it? Or is it because it's a church?

So we would have to determine what that use is that would define what. It's a social venue. So you're talking about an event center or like a banquet event center and so on. And so that's a use that we would have to evaluate if it's allowable. I believe that's a conditional use in the Ag Zone.

There's quite a few listed. That's one of them. Retreat facility, you name it. Yes.

I just wasn't sure if that really mattered or what they're doing in the use.

Always what they do matters. Good question. Yes. A wedding venue would be allowed on ag, but they're very limited in the number of people.

So a wedding venue is also another conditional use. And so you go before the BZA. And then the BZA can set limits on how often you have weddings. And then you have dimensional type things of amount of parking and so on that's on the site. Hours of operation. Hours of operation. Yes. The BZA can set all of those limitations. Yes.

All right.

Good discussion. And that traffic study, my understanding, has to be conducted during school. Yes. School's in session.

Yes, they wouldn't be able to do that. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I forgot about that.

The traffic study, it seems like the traffic problem is when they have events. It's not necessarily, you know what I'm saying?

Well, that's why the scope for knowing what the planning commission wants is so important because it's not going to be your normal.

And if you're not having the event, you don't know what traffic condition. Because school really doesn't matter. It's the timing of when you're having it and that event. It's not happening during school.

Those are the complexities of a traffic study. Odds are the events will be on a Saturday or Sunday when school isn't open. Yes. So it's squirreling. It is.

And that's why we're looking for clarification from planning commission.

I'm a little more confused than I was. I do my best.

Good information, though, to update the community up there because they're obviously concerned about it.

No, they have some valid questions. Absolutely. And it's hard to answer them.

Correct.

Well, thank you, Mr. Hine. You are off the hook, at least for a little while. Thank you. Thank you. We're going to move into public comment. Seeing no one in the room here, Mr. Swann, do we have anybody on the phone for public comment?

I have no one on the line.

OK, nobody on the phone. We're going to revisit admin open. Do we have any further comments or items for?

We do have approval of a closed meeting.

Are we going to do the agendas before they're closed?

No, they're closed. Do we have? OK. So we're going to have to approve these closed minutes. Yep. Do I have a motion to approve the closed minutes? I have a second. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? OK. So the board does approve those closed minutes. We'll move into administrative open. Do we have any further comments, statements on open?

I took enough of your time. That was all good.

There are two things for everyone to decide.

Okay. That was good stuff, though. Okay. Are we going to go ahead and get into agenda?

Yes.

Okay. Typically, we.

No, Wanda. You got me.

Okay. All right. Well, we're going to move into agenda items for the week of August 3rd. month and a Monday August 3rd. We have the Chamber breakfast at the fair with commissioners Gordon Kyler and Vigliotti attending at 8 p.m. 8 a.m. Tuesday August 4th at 5 p.m. We have annual national night out events at various locations with commissioners Gordon Krebs and Vigliotti attending those functions Wednesday August 5th nothing Thursday August 6. We have we meet at 9 o'clock as usual Item number one, priority Carol, a farm museum proclamation. And then we have another proclamation for emergency management month. Item number two, public comment for renewal for support and maintenance of computer aided dispatch. Item number three, a grant approval to submit application and acceptance award for FY27 for the Violence Against Women Act. Item number four, A review of MOUs with Veterans Improvement Project Literacy Council, MAGIC, and the Carroll County Historical Society. Independent. That's a typo. What did I say? No, it's not you. Yeah, you're right. You're right.

Not you. You read what? Yeah.

I read what? And I should know better. That's all right. Jason Sotok, forgive me. Item five, Spinning Authority for Inmate Medical Services. Item number six, Annual Renewal for Power DMS and New Modules. Item number seven, occupational physicals, drug testing, and other medical related services for fire EMS employees and volunteers. Item number eight, replacement of water valve bolts within the Freedom District service area. Item number nine, a change order scope amendment for consulting services for the revision of Carroll County zoning and site development codes. Item number 10, exercise option to purchase the Jane Blouse Shaw revocable living trust property. That's a county easement. Item number 11, freedom area plan amendment consultant presentation of initial findings. Item 12, approval of FY27 town-county agreements with Mount Airy, Tawny Town, Union Bridge, and Westminster. Item number 13, approval of resolution O.26.06 for year-end adjustments. Do I have any changes or revisions to those agenda items? OK. Seeing none, we're going to. And then on Sunday, August 9, Commissioner Keiler. Nothing listed for Friday, August 7. Nothing listed for Saturday, August 8. And Sunday, August 9, Commissioner Keiler, you have the podcast.

Hopefully Vigliotti's written it for me.

Yeah, I was about to say, you may want to reach out to him and get him going on that. For August, the week of August 10th, Monday, August 10th, a ribbon-cutting opening ceremony for the Tawny Town Senior Center Room Project with Commissioner Vigliotti attending. tuesday august 11th there's the ag center board meeting wednesday august 12th is the start of summer mako with several commissioners attending commissioners gordon kyler and krebs at this time farm museum board meeting at 9 30 a.m that same day and commissioner bugliotti will be attending thursday mako continues at 5 p.m on thursday the chamber of commerce biz challenge at the carroll county arts Council in Westminster Friday August 14th and Saturday August 15th make it continues and August 16th Sunday August 16th Commissioner Gordon you have the podcast any further changes or revisions to that particular week it

If it matters to us, I don't know the public cares. Saturday, August 15th is our church breakfast, and I'm sure Rhonda will smack me and make me get up around midnight and have her home, so I probably won't be there on Saturday.

Okay, okay. Noted. Thank you. Sounds like you're going to be busy. Seeing no more changes, do I have a motion for adjournment?

So moved.

All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Meeting is adjourned.