Waverly Woods

The date for the next Zoning Board hearing on Waverly Woods was reported incorrectly in Sunday's Howard County Sun.The hearing will resume at 8 p.m. Wednesday, June 16.The Howard County Sun regrets the error.Last week's Waverly Woods hearing was so rough Zoning Board members might want to wear combat boots to the next one.Board members were caught in a cross-fire Thursday night between opponents and advocates of the proposal to build a business, residential and golfing village on 682 rural acres along Marriottsville Road between Interstate 70 and Route 99."

ABOUT THE guy who paid $15,000 in a charity auction to have dinner with Tony Bennett but ended up having "Dinner in the Same Overpriced Restaurant Where Tony Bennett Will Be Eating": He has a beef. (Actually he had the veal! Badda-bing!) If somebody tells me that I'm donating $15,000 to have dinner in Little Italy with Tony Bennett, then I expect him to sit at my table and share a calamari appetizer, if not croon "To the Good Life." If that doesn't happen, I'm calling Tony Soprano, and he's calling Furio back from the old country, and badda-bing badda-boom!

For years, Baltimore-area politicians and developers tried to avoid public hysteria over subsidized housing by supporting more benign projects such as apartments for seniors. But that strategy is not working in Ellicott City, where some residents of the upscale Waverly Woods golf course development are up in arms about a proposed apartment house for moderate- income seniors. Developers say the four-story brick building resembles other senior developments in the county and insist that it would outclass the most expensive homes in the community - despite prices of more than $800,000 for single-family homes.

The first hole at Waverly Woods Golf Club looks intimidating. The landing area is a hillside that slopes left toward high rough. Between you and the green lies a creek flanked front and back by marsh. With a steep drop-off to its left, the green rises high above the fairway and looks crowned in the middle - not much margin for error. So, if you get the impression that focus is a key here, you're on the right track. This upscale course in Marriottsville, north of Interstate 70, requires calculation on just about every shot.

Waverly Woods II, the county's largest development since Columbia, won tentative approval yesterday from the county Zoning Board, but lawmakers cut 41 percent of its proposed office space.Faced with dogged neighborhood opposition, the rezoning case for the 682-acre project in Marriottsville and Woodstock had dragged through 16 days of hearings from last March to December. It was the longest-running case since 1976, when the Rouse Co. won its bid to annex hundreds of acres into Columbia."It's been a long process, and I think we got a better site plan as a result," said Waverly Woods II developer Donald R. Reuwer Jr. after the County Council, sitting as the Zoning Board, gave the go-ahead.

Waverly Woods II, the county's largest development since Columbia, won tentative approval yesterday from the county Zoning Board, but lawmakers cut 41 percent of its proposed office space.Faced with dogged neighborhood opposition, the rezoning case for the 682-acre project in Marriottsville and Woodstock had dragged through 16 days of hearings from last March to December.It was the longest-running case since 1976, when the Rouse Co. won its bid to annex hundreds of acres into Columbia."It's been a long process, and I think we got a better site plan as a result," said Waverly Woods II developer Donald R. Reuwer Jr. after the County Council, sitting as the Zoning Board, gave the go-ahead.

A third Howard County zoning board session tonight will try to achieve what two marathon, post-midnight meetings failed to reach last week - a decision on a proposed four-story apartment building for moderate-income seniors in Waverly Woods. After 10 residents of the expensive golf course community assailed the plan for the 102-unit structure at Thursday night's meeting as too big, with too little parking and too-small apartments, and as a threat to their property values, County Councilman Christopher J. Merdon, an Ellicott City Republican, cautioned the audience about the board's role.

Developer Donald L. Reuwer has lost his bid to rezone Waverly Woods in Ellicott City. The Howard County Zoning Board voted Wednesday night to rezone only the largest of four areas in his proposal for the 52-acre property. The board unanimously agreed to rezone the 27-acre site from residential to commercial use. Hundreds of area residents opposed the rezoning, fearing increased traffic, noise and the effects of development on their well water. Reactions to the decision were split. Some residents, who see development as unavoidable, made a deal to support Reuwer's rezoning proposals if he agreed not to commercially develop two other sites that total 11 acres.

Waverly Woods' developer wants to slash the amount of commercially zoned land in the mixed-use community nearly in half to make way for 350 seniors-only homes. Donald R. Reuwer Jr. of Land Design and Development asked the Zoning Board last night to allow the residences on a 151-acre property now zoned for business uses. The single-family houses and townhouses would be restricted to active adults ages 55 and older. The site sits to the west of Marriottsville Road, cradled on two sides by the Howard County landfill.

A plan to erect a building with moderately priced apartments for seniors in the midst of an upscale golf course community has drawn opposition from some residents, who would prefer that developers scatter the units. The residents of Waverly Woods, a development between Marriottsville and Woodstock next to Interstate 70, say the proposed four-story, 102-unit rental building won't fit the community of single-family homes, townhouses and condominiums. More than 40 residents attended a county Planning Board meeting yesterday morning and said they did not receive accurate information about the process early enough to voice their concerns, which include the possibility of renters using federal housing subsidies.