SNOW HILL – The Worcester County Commissioners postponed adoption of an implementation policy for the Mystic Harbor Sanitary Service Area last week, opting instead to schedule a public hearing on the topic.
Though it was presented as an internal staff policy, Commissioner Bud Church indicated he would like additional input on the issue.
“This is pretty big,” he said. “I think we need to hear both sides of this.”
According to Bob Mitchell, the county’s director of environmental programs, the implementation policy being presented was for the sale, allocation and use of the additional sewage treatment capacity now available in the Mystic Harbor Sanitary Service Area. The construction of the new Mystic Harbor Wastewater Treatment Plant resulted in 666 new sewer EDUs (equivalent dwelling units), which are essential to new development.
Construction of the new plant was expensive though, Mitchell explained, and the service area’s customers now faced a financial obligation of $8.1 million. To address the debt, county officials are hoping to sell a minimum of 30 EDUs a year.
As county staff members were developing the implementation policy this winter, local attorneys Mark Cropper and Hugh Cropper, representing at least two private owners of multiple EDUs, asked that the county consider allowing EDU transfers within the service area among private individuals. Such transfers, which allow a property owner who hasn’t used all of his EDUs to sell them to another property owner who needs them, have been allowed in the West Ocean City Sanitary Service Area since 1997, but have not been allowed in the Mystic Harbor Sanitary Service Area, which includes much of the southside of Route 50. In correspondence with county officials, the attorneys argued that their clients had EDUs they didn’t need and had been paying for them for years. They said there was no reason for the capacity to go unused.
“This will be positive for Worcester County,” Hugh Cropper wrote in a January letter to the commissioners. “I cannot imagine any downside. It will promote economic growth, allow the development and utilization of appropriately zoned properties and it is smart and sustainable growth. It will allow the utilization of EDUs which are otherwise sitting idle.”
Mitchell, however, said the Worcester County Water and Sewer Committee did not recommend allowing private transfers of EDUs within the Mystic Harbor Sanitary Service Area. According to Mitchell, allowing transfers in the West Ocean City Sanitary Service Area resulted in EDUs being “traded as commodities.” He said prices were inflated and economic development was hindered.
“Allowing transfers in Mystic Harbor would harm our financing plan,” he told the commissioners this week. “It [sewer capacity] should not be a commodity to be held by property owners.”
The county offers a financing plan when private property owners buy EDUs from the government that is often appealing to developers because it allows up to 50 percent of the cost to be financed over a period of time.
When Church asked if the commissioners would consider opening the floor to allow the attorneys, both of whom were present, to speak on the matter, county attorney Maureen Howarth pointed out that there may have been others interested in speaking on the topic who were not in attendance. She indicated a public hearing would be the proper venue for them to share their views.
Commissioner Joe Mitrecic agreed others might like to speak on the issue.
“It’s a huge parcel of land we’re talking about,” he said. “To give them the ability to weigh in and not other property owners would not be fair.”
Church made a motion to hold a public hearing before the implementation policy was adopted. Kelly Shannahan, the county’s assistant chief administrative officer, said the policy was essentially just semantics and that allowing transfers would “foul up” the county’s plans to sell EDUs.
“I don’t appreciate staff arguing against my motion,” Church replied.
The commissioners voted 6-0 to schedule a public hearing for March 15. Commissioner Jim Bunting abstained.
When contacted after Tuesday’s meeting, Mark Cropper said he’d been notified by Shannahan just that morning that the implementation policy would be discussed.
“I appreciate the commissioners recognizing the importance of this issue to my client and giving me the opportunity to discuss it in greater detail at the public hearing scheduled for March 15,” he said.
