The county council raised unexpected objections to a proposed graduate housing development yesterday and agreed to delay voting on the project after a lengthy review process that has lasted almost a year.
The council voiced concerns about the proposed Mazza Grandmarc Apartments’ appearance and environmental impact. However, graduate students accused the county of stalling and expressed frustration over having to wait on the 630-bed apartment, which developers initially hoped would open for fall 2009.
The building plan last year won approval from the Maryland Parks and Planning Board, which traditionally approves developments, but ran into red tape after the county seized authority to oversee the project, an increasingly common move on the part of the council.
Yesterday, the county placed the project under a period of “extended advisement,” a step that will delay any vote for as many as 60 days.
After more than a year of fighting their way onto the council’s agenda, the project’s developers, led by CEO of Collegiate Hall PropertiesRuss Davis, said they had never heard any of the objections presented yesterday in their four years of lobbying to get the project approved at the city and county levels.
While he said he would to try to comply with the county’s demands that the project use a greater percentage of brick in its exterior facade and that it conform closer to new environmental standards, Davis called the council’s stalling a political ploy to impress constituents.
“We’re hung up in a political issue here with the council,” he said. “Until today I’ve never heard a single objection to our project’s design. It was just the council telling me they hadn’t had time to get to it.”
Even if the project, which is slated for construction near the intersection of Route 1 and Hollywood Avenue, received approval at the county council’s next meeting in two weeks, it probably wouldn’t open until 2011 because of the delays, Davis said.
If the council denies the project, Davis said his last resort could be a lawsuit against the county.
College Park City Planner Terry Schum said such intense scrutiny from the county council would be rare, if not unheard of, five years ago. But since some recent shifts in the council administration, she said such strict oversight has become almost standard.
“The current process is very lengthy and could be very frustrating,” she said. “Supporters of these projects certainly would like more streamlined review process.”
At the hearing yesterday, council members said they were only trying to ensure the building met quality standards laid out in county codes and regulations.
The bulk of the council’s criticism centered on a county provision that mandates all housing projects along Route 1 be have facades that are 75 percent brick. Plans for Mazza fall just short of that requirement.
While Schum said it was standard for developers to request exemptions to such minute provisions – a city housing project has never been approved without at least one – District 1 County Councilman Tom Dernoga pressed the project’s developer to meet the code entirely.
“Frankly, I don’t know how you can approve a project that does not meet the requirements,” he said. “I’m just taken aback.”
But with the potential to expand a graduate housing market that currently only serves 5 percent of graduate students, Moore said the argument seemed insignificant.
“It’s hard to understand why they are so stuck on the idea that everything has to be brick,” she said. “Of course everyone wants quality housing, but I don’t see brick as the only sign of quality.”
Dernoga also convinced the council to demand the proposed apartment meet new “green building” standards that measure energy efficiency, even though they are not required by county regulations.
At the end of a debate that was unusually impassioned for a county council hearing, Dernoga sarcastically dismissed the objections presented by the developer’s lawyers and city officials as “very persuasive.”
Contact reporter Ben Slivnick at slivnickdbk@gmail.com.
