Adequate Facilities

The county's General Assembly delegation last week tentatively agreed to sponsor legislation that would allow the county to collect excise taxes from developers and use the money to build or improve major roads.The tax is tied to a complex adequate facilities plan that County Executive Charles I. Ecker intends to bring before the County Council in January.The tax, which Ecker expects will bring in $6 million annually, would be put into a "development road improvement fund."It would be withdrawn only if the county matches it at a rate of 2 to 1. Use ofthe money would be restricted to major capital projects.

Business leader John F. Liparini, a political adviser to County Executive Elizabeth Bobo, said Wednesday that Bobo's proposed adequate facilities legislation will be "devastating to the building economy" here in the next 6 to 12 months if enacted in its present form.Liparini was joined in his bleak forecast by fellow developers Alton J.Scavo, vice president of the Rouse Co., and John L. Troutman, president of the Troutman Co.All three were panelists at a four-hour seminar on adequate facilities ordinances, sponsored by a Baltimore law firm in Columbia, Wednesday.

Harford County would curtail preliminary approval of home building in more than half the county as a result of a bill passed late Tuesday night by the County Council. After more than more two hours of public hearing and debate among themselves, the council members voted 5-2 in favor of changing the adequate public facilities laws. Under the bill, preliminary approval for new homes would be interrupted in any school district with a school that exceeds its enrollment capacity by more than 5 percent.

There's a right way and a wrong way to manage growth during a recession. The Howard County Council, in January lifted an unpopular cap on building permits, is choosing the wrong way. The council claims the cap is exacerbating a down real estate market and is in fact unnecessary at a time when builders are hard-pressed to fund projects. "I don't think our vote has anything to do with the intent and purpose of our growth-management plans," said Council President Vernon C. Gray.The issue isn't so much the permit limit as it is Howard's continued inability to deal effectively with growth.

If the Hampstead Town Council approves a resolution introduced Tuesday, the town will sue itself.Councilman Wayne Thomas, concerned with crowded schools and congested roads, introduced the resolution to "engage the services of a qualified attorney to review the Hampstead code and, if warranted, file suit."The suit would test the municipal adequate facilities law, which deters development without available schools, roads, water and sewers."If the court upholds the law, then we will know we have the authority to disapprove developments," said Mr. Thomas.

Howard County planners need to speed up work on a transportation master plan if they want to keep up with the county's needs, says the head of the panel that drafted the county's adequate public facilities laws."

The Howard County Council voted unanimously last night to make developers pay an excise tax on all residential and commercial construction and to require builders to pass both a schools test and a roads test before starting their projects.The so-called adequate facilities legislation will take effect in 60 days. Councilwoman Shane Pendergrass, D-1st, had sought to make the bill take effect immediately, but was outvoted, 4-1.The five-bill, five-resolution legislative package has three main features:* A roads test to determine if intersections can accommodate traffic generated by a proposed development;* A schools test to determine if nearby schools will be overcrowded when new residents move into a proposeddevelopment;* An excise tax imposed on all new residential and commercial construction.

The County Commissioners ironed out the kinks in a proposed interim development control ordinance yesterday with its author, a nationally known growth expert.They could do little to repair what Dr. Robert H. Freilich called the expected "whiplash" he has received from developers, builders and real estate agents who fear the ordinance will stymie business."Homebuilders and Realtors are an important economic aspect to this community," said Dr. Freilich, a law professor at the University of Missouri and chairman of the American Planners Association.

Two years ago, the relationship between Carroll County leaders and officials of the county's eight municipalities was marked by rancor and bickering. Former county commissioners blamed the towns for exceeding the county's growth limits. The municipal leaders shot back, pointing to the county's lack of growth controls as the reason for crowded classrooms, congested roads and a strained water supply. Since then, however, the county's relations with the towns have turned around. County and municipal leaders believe this spirit of working together is important as the county is close to adopting a revamped policy to better manage residential growth.

The Baltimore County Council has decided to strengthen the county's restriction on development that might cause schools to become overcrowded. The change involving the adequate facilities ordinance directs the county's planning office to consider not only how crowded schools are today, but also how crowded approved developments are going to make them tomorrow. This is entirely appropriate. But, unfortunately, matters involving schools are rarely so cut and dried. There are occasions when development plans sit around for years.