SNOW HILL – The Worcester County Commissioners expressed no interest in a sectional rezoning of properties along Route 589.
In spite of a recommendation from the county’s planning commission for a comprehensive review of zoning in the area of Route 589 and Grays Corner Road, the commissioners made no motion for that to proceed. Instead, the five rezoning requests that prompted exploration of a sectional rezoning will be considered individually.
In early March, the planning commission was presented with rezoning requests from five properties near the Ocean Downs Casino. Owners of the properties, all with E-1 estate zoning, wanted to see them rezoned commercial.
“The planning commission, in their discussion of these five rezoning cases, felt it might be better to look at this pocket of E-1 as a sectional rezoning rather than this piecemeal five particular parcels,” said Ed Tudor, the county’s director of development review and permitting. “As some of us have referred to, it’s like the mouth of a jack-o-lantern. We have one property subject to rezoning, skip two we have another one, skip a couple and you’ve got another one and so forth. That is really not a good way to approach zoning. It’s something that should be perhaps looked at in a much broader sense. The planning commission is recommending that you give them the authority to do that.”
Commissioner Jim Bunting asked if the county should consider rezoning the casino property — which is zoned agricultural but has a special exception — if it pursued a sectional rezoning.
“That property should be changed to commercial also…,” he said. “That’s really been an abuse of a special exception everybody’s gone along with all these years.”
Tudor said there were a lot of nuances involved with the property’s special exception.
“That would require not just in my opinion a rezoning but a significant change in the zoning code itself,” Tudor said.
When asked how many properties were in the area proposed for the sectional rezoning, staff said there were about 15 properties involved. Staff said that while the county hadn’t had a sectional rezoning recently there had been at least one in the last 20 years. Tudor said he thought that in this case a sectional rezoning would be appropriate from a planning perspective.
Commissioner Chip Bertino said the five properties seeking rezoning all wanted to be designated commercial. He asked how much weight their request would have during a sectional rezoning.
“I can’t speak for the planning commission members,” Tudor said.
Bunting asked if anyone had brought up the issue of spot zoning. When Tudor said that no one had, Bunting asked for his thoughts on the issue.
“I have distinct concerns with that for several reasons,” Tudor said. “One, when you leave residentially zoned properties and residentially used properties in between commercial properties I think it’s problematic. I think it also affects the viability of the commercial development of those properties because you have different buffering and requirements when commercial properties adjoin a residential property as opposed to another commercial property. To me it causes some distinct rubs there.”
Because there was no motion to have the planning commission explore a sectional rezoning, the five Route 589 rezoning requests will move forward. They will be considered by the commissioners after the planning commission makes a recommendation.
