Wicomico Neighborhood Congress – November 2007

One challenge I have in writing about local events is how to make them relevant to a readership that comes from all over. I have readers from all over the country and a lot of them likely don’t care about what goes on in Salisbury, Maryland.

But tonight we talked about a subject that has impact throughout our nation – at least in areas that have a thriving economy – and that subject is growth. It’s the second time in a month I heard an outside “expert” on the subject and this effort drew a pretty good audience. The room was set up for 75 and most of the seats were full as you’ll see.

A near-capacity throng came out to Westside Intermediate School to hear talk about growth.

The issue for the evening was, “Empowering Community Residents to Respond to Growth.” You know, when you think about it, doesn’t that title sound a bit loaded? It makes growth sound like a bad thing, when in fact the opposite effect of stagnation spells doom for a city or region economically.

Our featured speaker, who you see on the left in the picture above, was Jason Sartori of the National Center for Smart Growth Research and Education.

Jason Sartori was brought in as the expert speaker for this evening's program. The subject of his discussion was Adequate Public Financing Ordinances, or APFO's for short.

When I saw the title of the group Jason worked for, I thought, “here we go again, another Eben Fodor.” But Jason presented a pretty balanced view in his presentation titled, “APFO’s: Simple in Theory, Complex in Implementation.”

First of all, this photo shows the slide giving a definition of an APFO:

A slide with his definition of an APFO, which I'll go through in the body of the story. The slide reads, 'New development may be approved only when the roads or schools that are affected will be adequate to support it; otherwise, it must be denied.'

He went through a brief history of these ordinances in Maryland, where most of the state’s largest counties have these regulations beginning with Montgomery County adopting theirs way back in 1973. Within our state Wicomico County is the second-largest county without an APFO, trailing only slightly larger Cecil County. The idea behind these laws was to prevent development from leapfrogging the facilities needed to support it. It gives a rationale for prioritizing the construction of new infrastructure as well. Additionally, Jason noted two laws that were enacted by the Maryland General Assembly to assist with regulating development, the 1992 Growth Act and 1997 Smart Growth Areas Act.

In all of Maryland’s counties that have adopted APFO regulations, schools and roads are taken into account but after that items that are evaluated vary widely. There were also other issues with how counties were using these statutes.

A study Sartori cited found that these applications were inconsistent with both the Growth Act and the Smart Growth Areas Act in their implementation. In fact, it was contended that these were fueling the patterns of development that Smart Growth principles tried to curtail. Of course, one main effect was growth spilling over into counties which had not adopted APFO’s. Obviously, developers did not become rich by being stupid so they go where the laws were more friendly to their interests. Sartori opined that counties could help themselves by prioritizing capital spending to areas where the APFO standards weren’t being met.

In looking at the blanket APFO statement on the slide above, Jason brought up several questions that affected the implementation of these regulations, such as:

  • What exceptions will be made?
  • In the category of schools, does age-restricted housing allow a waiver?
  • What about partial approvals?
  • What is the definition of “adequate” anyway?
  • Is there a timeframe involved regarding support?
  • What if a developer offers mitigation?
  • Finally, is denial forever?

In order to address these concerns, Sartori suggested that APFO’s be tied to capital investment plans, the overall master plan for the county, impact fees, and agreement on growth goals between counties and their municipalities. A good APFO, he noted, is part of an overall strategy and is reasonable. Funding infrastructure could be handled in part by impact fees or real estate transfer taxes.

The only real objections I had were his example of “zoning like you mean it”, restricting development in agricultural areas to something like a house every 15 acres; and his advocation of transfer of development rights and land preservation to steer growth. That just intrudes a bit too much on property rights for my taste.

One telling answer to a question he was asked was where Jason could not cite a truly successful example of an APFO. They haven’t worked too effectively “so far”, Sartori conceded.

There were also a number of other speakers who filled us in on various aspects of growth. We heard the local perspectives from Jack Lenox, Director of Planning and Zoning for Wicomico County and Tracy Gordy, who handles our region for the Maryland Department of Planning. The main point I got from Lenox was that the county is subordinate to municipalities when it comes to pecking order – in this case, the county could enact an APFO but it wouldn’t apply to municipalities. Gordy added the important point to me that, even though the state reviews local comprehensive plans, the local bodies can ignore the state recommendations (with exceptions outlined here.)

It was on a local level that I was disappointed with the anti-growth slant. For those unfamiliar with Hebron, the site of the meeting, it was selected as a locale because of a large development slated on the outskirts of town called Waller’s Landing. Over its 20 year projected buildout, the project would add 1600 residential units, retail, and office space to the town of Hebron’s population of about 900 people (the land has already been annexed, with a greenbelt buffer proposed between the development and the town proper.) While Kelly Bergen of Hebron’s planning committee noted the project was still in its conceptual stage and still had to undergo several hearings, the two members of the Hebron community who spoke complained about a lack of cooperation in getting information and came across as ones who thought the project was being railroaded through. The PowerPoint the pair used noted on the bottom of each slide, “There is nothing wrong with being a small town.”

According to numbers provided by Mrs. Mumford and Mrs. Insley, the two anti-Waller speakers, the 1600 units and 51 acres of commercial development would be built on 432 acres. It translates to about 5 units an acre, which does seem a little dense, but isn’t out of line with older neighborhoods in urban areas. (I lived for a time in an inner-city area with 35′ wide x 120′ deep lots, that would run about 10 units an acre. We managed.)

What I’m looking for is a happy medium, one where growth isn’t rampantly unchecked to a point where traffic and schools become unbearably overcrowded, but not choked off so that people begin leaving because of a lack of economic opportunity. My biggest issue with growth on the Eastern Shore is that housing gets built without the good jobs to support it. (With the real estate market as it is currently, a good job may be that of caretaker to mostly unsold and vacant condominium buildings.) Sartori cited population estimates for Wicomico County that had us adding about 1,000 people a year to the county for the foreseeable future, through 2030. While that sounds like a lot, bear in mind that it’s about 1% a year for our county and that’s not unmanageable nor will it suddenly suck up all of our agricultural land as the naysayers like to claim.

But as I continue to say about state issues, we are the canary in the coal mine in so many ways. Apparently we’re becoming a haven for anti-growth sentiment and I think it’s time the other side has its say too. I came into the WNC seeking solutions, but NIMBYism is not a solution that is going to be appealing to us in the long run.

Author: Michael

It's me from my laptop computer.

5 thoughts on “Wicomico Neighborhood Congress – November 2007”

  1. Don’t you think that Andy is a none story with E.J. Pipkin entering the race? He has virtually no name recognition outside of his little peice of the district, and has now been eclipsed by a well funded and well-known sitting state senator. I think Andy Harris is going to be left out in the cold on election day.

  2. Michael, what a bunch of crap.

    The speakers are burying the crucial concerns, that of how specifically a town should develop, in a sea of minutia.

    To not base growth concerns and conversations on the idea of putting home, work, and shopping closer together and creating a very walkable town, then pure drivel is the result.

    So too, the necessity for a tight urban growth boundary outside of which parks and forest are preserved… blah, blah, blah – the only human based practical solutions I have been blabbering about for years.

    Michael, your last two paragraph as a response to the WNC meeting are extremely obtuse and vague.

    Now here is an effort headed in the right direction, minus your protestations:

    “The only real objections I had were his example of “zoning like you mean it”, restricting development in agricultural areas to something like a house every 15 acres; and his advocation of transfer of development rights and land preservation to steer growth. That just intrudes a bit too much on property rights for my taste.”

    …but you still don’t get it – the American landscape is a total disaster and getting worse by the minute, and drastic steps should be taken.

    Pole on!
    Admiral of the Wicomico Ditch

Comments are closed.