Housing progress lack vexes county

If each word were a brick, Charles County would have several new neighborhoods in its most needy areas. Unfortunately letters do not a home build.

Last week the commissioners were presented with an update of the April 2007 housing summit's top 10 recommendations for the county, but talk quickly turned from potential possibilities and pending proposals to frustration over a lack of tangible progress. "It's a good presentation, but we're running out of time. It's been two and a half years almost exactly since we had the housing summit and we have accomplished a little and we've talked about it a lot," said Charles County commissioners' President F. Wayne Cooper (D).

"What I see on this list are a bunch of options with choices still to be made about which direction to take," said Commissioner Gary V. Hodge (D). "What I hope to see are action items with definite end points."

"We haven't necessarily given up the possibility that we will have a shovel in the ground before the end of this year," said Chuck Beall, director of the planning and growth management department. "There are discussions that need to take place with the housing authority, there's ongoing discussions and negotiations with some of the development community. Once we're in the position to finalize the discussion and come up with concrete proposals that we can bring forth before the county commissioners, we can do that."

The impatience of the commissioners stems from the tune of less talk and a lot more action that was first sung in late May.

The top 10 recommendations were the product of the 2007 housing summit, among them a push for more affordable and workforce housing, finding alternative funding sources and taking a closer look at the housing status and alternatives in Nanjemoy.

In the spring the commissioners asked staff to define affordable and workforce housing, study the county's home review process and consider any changes to the books that could be made for zoning, square footage or other real estate-related requirements.

This past summer an amendment was proposed to reduce the minimum housing square footage for single-family dwellings in mixed use building zones from 1,650 square feet to 1,250 square feet. It's up for discussion in a planning commission work session next month.

The housing authority accepted affordable housing as homes affordable by households earning between 30 and 80 percent of the median family income for Charles County; the most recent figure calculated by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development is $102,000.

Workforce housing is achieved by a household earning between 60 and 120 percent of the median family income for the county.

"Now that we have definitions for workforce and affordable housing I think we have a range of income levels we're trying to accommodate," Beall said. "I think if we look at our existing housing stock and the market, working with the real estate community and development community we'll have an idea of what the actual needs are; what percentage of the housing stock do we really need to target? It's really a demographics exercise. Once we have the ability to do that, utilizing these definitions we'll be in a better position to make recommendations to the county commissioners."

Having been asked to address the Nanjemoy area and Nanjemoy village housing options, the county staffers presented the commissioners with the proposal to expand the boundaries of the latter and options to purchase existing homes in the former.

"One of the things we've been trying to steadily do is create new housing," said Karen Cieplak, director of community services for the county. "Since all of these action plans to construct, renovate or purchase have a fiscal note … [that's] pretty high. Perhaps there would be an alternative if that investment of money was going to be made in new housing. It could also perhaps be made in taking a look at affordable housing already in Nanjemoy that's for sale or in foreclosure, and asking the state to fund the purchase of that property to put individual families in those homes."

Using existing homes means the county could avoid the lengthy processes behind rezoning or applying for a change in the state's priority funding boundaries.

Cieplak said she believed there is a lot of support for looking outside the usual box of options for the Nanjemoy community and wanted to get together next month with the housing authority to flesh out the financing options.

"I'm really excited because I feel we're taking not giant steps, but some steps towards resolving some of the challenges that we face particularly in the rural areas," said commissioners' Vice President Edith J. Patterson (D), who represents the district that includes Nanjemoy. "We know the challenges within a rural community, because it's not just housing it's a sense of mindset, it's a sense of looking at tradition and most of all it's developing trust."

"Clearly there's a need to see brick and mortar … but I don't think we should lose sight of the fact we have responded and have been looking at this critical issue," said Commissioner Reuben B. Collins II (D), in response to Cooper's query as to whether or not to hold an April 2010 housing summit. "A summit continuing to draw attention to the needs of establishing a broader housing base is something we should always maintain as a priority."