A county hearing on the proposed development at the Country Club of Maryland began Friday despite requests to postpone the proceedings until the county completes studies that could aide challengers? defense.
Development opponents asked county zoning commissioner William Wiseman to postpone the hearing, citing unfinished county environmental and school impact analyses. Their request was apparently denied when Wiseman began the hearing without making a formal decision.
When the hearing broke for lunch, Wiseman said he tabled the request for a postponement until next week because residents and lawyers were already gathered.
But J. Carroll Holzer, an attorney representing the Idlewylde community, said the hearing should not have started. He said the county has not yet finished studying the country club?s request to pay a fee instead of providing required open space, nor has it finalized new guidelines for the way school districts are identified as overcrowded.
“We?re entitled to have that,” he said. “How can we argue the community?s position if analysis hasn?t been done by two county agencies?”
Earlier this week, county planning director Pat Keller toldThe Examiner new school impact regulations were in place and the development?s approval process ? and 14 others waiting on the regulations ? could move forward. When pressed for copies, he said he would provide them by Monday at the latest. But at the hearing Friday, a county employee told Wiseman that staff members were meeting that afternoon to discuss the matter.
Keller and other county officials have said the school analysis is a moot point considering the homes, 46 duplexes in all, will be marketed to customers 55 and older.
“[The community is] going to use everything in their means to stop this, and that?s OK,” Keller said Wednesday. “The development process is very transparent. It?s very open.”
But Idlewylde activists like Cynthia Jabbs ? who said she will have children in high school when she is 55 ? argue the age requirement will be difficult to enforce.
