| UPDATE: Item 12 |
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On Thursday, May 2, 2013, the Montgomery County Planning Board will have a discussion around dropping Rural Open Space easements on two properties. One of the properties is the dedicated Rural Open Space next to Farquhar Middle School in Olney. Here is the packet on this discussion topic.
...The process required to exchange properties- the existing school site for the Park Property will be established through a complicated process outlined in separate agreements among MCPS, M-NCPPC, the County and Pulte, which will be presented to the Planning Board in the near future. The action requested by the Board at this time is approval of the policy to provide guidance to Planning Staff and MCPS to determine, if appropriate, the conditions to release the existing ROS easement from the Park Property – the first step in determining whether, and how the MCPS can move forward...
Olney parents e-mail campaign to get Planning Board to do what they want.
ReplyDeleteFuture Farquhar Community Coalition
The Planning Board meets tomorrow to discuss, and perhaps adopt, a policy on releasing Rural Open Space easements. This is something that must happen to get the Farquhar Land Swap done.
Please email the Planning Board NOW in support of this policy - just cut and paste the recommended language below, add your name and address and SEND.
Thanks,
Troy Kimmel
On Behalf of the Future Farquhar Community Coalition Executive Board
SEND EMAIL BELOW (add your name & address) TO:
MCP-Chair@mncppc-mc.org
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Dear Planning Board Members,
I am writing in support of your May 2nd Agenda Item #12 - "Discussion Rural Open Space Policy."
A policy allowing the flexibility to release certain Rural Open Space Easements, while still protecting rural open space, is needed in Montgomery County. Such a policy would allow for the Farquhar Middle School land-swap, and also allow for the accelerated opening of Olney's new active recreation park.
I support the staff's recommended critieria for releasing Rural Open Space Easements, and urge you to adopt them as policy.
Regards,
NAME
ADDRESS
This swap is going to happen no matter what, but the document shows 'transparently' how the law gets changed in Montgomery County if certain parties don't like it. Alternatively, MCPS and the Planning Board can ignore the law, which is what usually happens. This public discussion is rare for this government. Enjoy it. This is what you voted for.
ReplyDeleteAs a reminder, the Planning Board members are chosen by the county council. One planning board seat is now open and a few people have applied for the position. If you are interested in who gets chosen, you can write to the county council and tell them what you think. The council holds open public interviews with all the candidates that you can attend.
ReplyDeleteMaybe the proposed email should be expanded to include all the uses that fit under "public interest"..
ReplyDeleteAffordable housing (HOC), county warehouses, county office buildings, bus depots, storage yards, maintenance facilities -- the possibilities are really endless. Any state, county or federal facility would fall under "public interest".
One could even make the argument that more homes, close to existing utilities, would also be in the public interest. The way the "policy" is proposed, you could apply an ROS easement to a piece of agricultural ground, as long as it is in the same watershed, and make a proposal to redevelop an ROS out parcel. A bonus for the farmer that can now sell easement rights of an otherwise undevelopable property to the detriment of those living in, adjacent to or on the same road as the Rural Neighborhood Cluster subdivisions.
Keep in mind that Rural Open Space is an even more restrictive covenant that is being placed on an out parcel where development is already prohibited. Again, Rural Open Space is a restrictive covenant place on an out parcel where development is already prohibited.
Also, when looking at this, the qualitative elements seem to be ignored. The FMS piece, used by staff as an example, already has a significant Forest Conservation area on it to protect the headwaters of a tributary to Batchellors Run.
The Rural Open Space in these subdivisions was often required to be in a given location because it, as per intent, preserves "sensitive natural resources, other sensitive areas and associated habitat". These RNC subdivisions were fully vetted through long and very public processes and now the Planning Board wants to simply side step their previous rulings and acquiesce to the vocal minority.
Keep in mind, there is no site plan or re-subdivision requirement for government agencies. Once the Planning Board unilaterally authorizes the abandonment of these easements, the only authority they have is the Forest Conservation Plan. Mandatory referral is simply a courtesy review and all comments made by the impacted public can simply be ignored by the agency making the application. Carol Rubin suggested that this flexibility was needed because otherwise decade old decisions would block current needs and she paralleled this to Forest Conservation Easements. There might have been some value to this theory if both examples weren't part of ACTIVE subdivisions! The "swap" had been discussed at length even as site plan amendments were actively being voted on in front of the Planning Board.
Furthermore, changes to Forest Conservation Plans is punitive and a last resort option. With 2:1 and 4:1 replacements being the norm, revisions to existing plans required, notice to impacted parties, and a specific provision that the concerns of those impacted need to be addressed.
This is a slippery slope indeed. ROS was believed to be preserved in perpetuity as open space. This is a conclusion that any logical resident could arrive at and this is the reason many of these homes purchased next to ROS demanded a premium. Now, without a formal policy in place, two applications have already been submitted to remove the perpetuity from these currently protected vistas, stream valleys, meadows and forests.
How many more applications do you think will follow? Does anyone know how many hundreds, or thousands, of acres this opens up for redevelopment?
A quickly drafted policy to address the vocal minority, a vocal minority in their own community and much smaller percentage of the County as a whole, is not how proper planning procedure is implemented.
This is exactly why "in perpetuity" was required in the first place.
For those that forget the discussion at the County Council, a summary begins at the bottom of Page 4.
http://www6.montgomerycountymd.gov/Content/council/pdf/agenda/col/2004/041026/2004102607.pdf